Root Access
by elev
Summary: "She wanted you to *what*?" Shaw said around a mouthful of eggs. Or, Root has submissive fantasies and a wireless toy. All she's missing is somebody to hold the remote. Too bad she's so bad at asking for things...and the control issues don't help either. Takes place a month or three after "Wireless". Established Shaw/Elizabeth, Shaw/Root, slow Root/Elizabeth. It's complicated...
1. Chapter 1

_A/N So like...grad school. I faintly remember this "free time" thing from months ago..._

 _A "Wireless" sequel has long been on my todo but I wasn't sure how to pull it off. This story popped into my head and refused to leave. I think I accidentally an awkward love triangle. I'm not sure how this one is going to end, so your thoughts are very welcome._

 _Don't worry, I have something planned for another story for when Shaw blows the bet, and I'm working on Feature Creep still._

#####

I was getting way too used to having members of John's Bat-squad randomly show up at my apartment. It was hardly even a surprise anymore. I'd open the door and John would be there, sitting patiently at my kitchen table, or Shaw would be sprawled on the couch watching TV and eating a carton of _my_ ice cream. (And she always went for the flavors I liked!) I didn't mind those two. They were relatively good guests. John, despite his teasing, had a pretty decent sense of privacy and stayed out of my bedroom like he was supposed to; as for Shaw, there was nothing in there that she hadn't seen before, and she usually bothered to buy more ice cream if we ran out.

John showing up was no big deal, and my apartment was practically Shaw's second home when it came to relaxing and eating my food. But _sometimes_ I'd come home to find that my bedroom door was ajar, and the intermittent clatter of my mechanical keyboard drifted through the gap, and that's when I got annoyed.

"For the last freaking time, Root," I said, pushing the bedroom door open with a shove. "This isn't an Internet cafe."

The hacker was slouched in my computer chair, her stockinged feet kicked up on my desk. She was wearing gray sweatpants and a blue T-shirt. A pair of dark sneakers had been chucked carelessly to the side. A dark green hoodie was draped over the back of the chair. Root had the keyboard balanced on her thighs and was pecking away at some program running on _my_ desktop computer. You know, the one I kept locked and encrypted?

She didn't even spare me a glance.

"But your Internet connection is so much better than the coffee shop's," she simpered. Her narrow fingers danced over my battered keyboard as she switched rapidly between windows. "And you finally upgraded your CPU to a hex-core for me."

"Uh," I scoffed, walking up behind her, "I upgraded my CPU for _me_."

"For your multi-threaded algorithm?"

I gripped the back of my chair and tilted it back until Root was gazing upward at me with those annoyingly wide, innocent eyes.

"If you closed the terminal window I left up, you _will_ regret it," I said coolly.

"Stop _worrying_ , silly," Root said, smiling. "It's still running, see?" I glanced up to see that, indeed, the program that had been crunching numbers for three days was still purring along, making the CPU fan work overtime to shed the excess heat. "And I fixed it for you."

"You _what_?" I said, tearing my eyes away from the screen and glaring down at Root. Had she messed with my program? Changed it somehow while it was running? Oh, if I found even _one_ line of code out of place—

"I went over your algorithm and jotted in some improvements in the comments," she said. "You can decide for yourself if you want to implement them."

Well. At least she hadn't actually _changed_ anything. "Thanks. I guess. Not." Releasing the chair, I sighed, standing up straighter and running my fingers through my hair. "Look, Root, what are you doing at my place?"

"I'm using your computer," she said demurely.

I wasn't even going to bother asking how she'd gotten past the new screen lock. I'd thought for sure this one would've kept her out.

"No, duh," I said. I leaned against my bookshelf and crossed my arms. "I mean it."

"I mean it too. I needed a few dozen CPU cores for my latest project, and you've got lots to spare." She motioned vaguely towards the desktops stacked two high along the wall. Don't worry, I nice'd the processes. You won't notice them. They'll finish in a few hours."

"Is it anything that's going to bring the FBI knocking?" I asked, suddenly nervous.

Root made a scrunched up face. "You think my cracking jobs are shoddy enough to attract anybody's attention?"

"I think you'd do something like that just to mess with me."

"Please," Root said, returning her attention to the monitor. "If I wanted to mess with you, I'd do something more lighthearted, like filling all of your hard drives with tentacle porn. I'm mischievous, not an asshole."

"You call kidnapping mischievous?"

"That was months ago," Root said, glancing at me. She rolled her eyes. "Jeesh," she said dramatically, "you lure a pretty girl to an abandoned warehouse and tie her up for an hour just _once,_ and she never lets you forget it."

"Gee, what a bitch," I said dryly.

"It was technically for your own protection," Root reminded me. "And it was actually less than an hour. And I apologized to Shaw, and I _did_ promise I wouldn't do anything like that again. Unless you want a more consensual reenactment?" Another glance, this one decidedly dirtier. I ignored her suggestive overtones.

"I want you to tell me what you're doing."

"Nothing bad," Root said mysteriously. "Seriously. Nobody's gonna notice."

"Right."

"There," Root said happily, striking the Enter key and putting the keyboard back on the desk. "It'll send me the results when it's done."

"You know I'm going to kill the processes."

"You can try," Root said sweetly.

"Whatever." I pinched the bridge of my nose and sat down in the smaller, more rickety chair to the side of the desk, sighing. "Just as long as it doesn't mess with _my_ code."

"It won't," Root said. There was awkward silence for a moment, and then, she added awkwardly, "You look tired."

"I just spent three hours helping a friend salvage her Master's project code," I grumbled, rotating the chair gently back and forth with one foot. "She just about destroyed the Git repository. It took _ages_ to piece together the project. Not the way I wanted to spend my morning."

"Owch. First timer with Git?"

"Yeah." I chuckled. "She's not used to version control software."

"Mmm. Tough times. I remember having to learn how to use a VCS," Root said. Her false sympathy was hardly convincing.

"No, you don't," I said, scoffing. "One of your aliases helped _write_ a VCS."

"Shh," Root said conspiratorially, "nobody's supposed to know about him. Besides, I'm trying to be sympathetic here."

" _Trying_ being the operative word."

But at least she was trying. That was progress, for Root.

"I think I get an A for effort," she said. I rolled my eyes. For a few moments, neither of us spoke, and the room was filled with the soft whisper of the computer cooling fans. Suddenly, Root snapped her fingers and grinned. She took her feet off the desk. "I just remembered," she said cheerfully, "there _was_ something I was going to ask you about."

"Oh?" I asked. I highly doubted Root had "just" remembered anything. She wasn't one prone to forgetfulness. No, if I knew her at all, she'd been waiting until I was in a less irritated mood so she could start talking about something annoying or uncomfortable.

I wasn't wrong.

"Yeah," Root said. She pulled open one of my desk drawers and removed an object about the size of my hand, holding it up. "So, I've, uh, been meaning to ask you—"

"Root, what the _fuck_ ," I said. "Put that down!"

And that was Root. For every minute she acted like a mature adult—for every minute she even _tried_ acting like a mature adult—she made up for it with an hour's worth of bullshit.

"You didn't let me finish," she pouted.

"Put it down."

"I'm just curious about this thing," she said, motioning to it.

"Put it down."

The object in question was roughly four inches long, two wide, and a little more than a half inch thick; a rounded, gently curving shape that tapered in width towards one end. It curved slightly inward. Its blue silicon exterior had a velvety sheen to it and was perturbed only by an elongated bump near the top of the inner face and, below that, a flexible, rounded protrusion. It was a vibrator. A _very_ fancy wireless, bluetooth enabled, inductive-charging vibrator...designed for discreet public use.

It had quickly become my favorite sex toy since Shaw had convinced me to wear it while working the Trisoft case. It was dastardly effective. Hell, the mere sight of it was enough to make me feel a little warm inside.

I couldn't help but notice that Root wasn't putting it down. In fact, she was running her fingers all over it, which was pissing me off.

"I hear it's a really nice piece of technology," Root said absently. She pushed one of the two hidden buttons on the front and it buzzed to life, producing a low hum that caught my ear immediately.

"It is," I said. "It's also not yours. _Give it_."

"In a second, I'm admiring."

"Stop fondling it and get your own, you pervert."

"Fiiiine," Root said. She handed it over, and immediately my hand began to tingle. I turned the vibrator back off and set it on the desk, well out of reach of Root. I could feel myself blushing.

"You really need better boundaries," I said, jabbing a finger towards her chest. "Where did you even find it? I've told you, you can borrow stuff from the computer part bins, but the red box is off-limits and don't even _think_ about looking—"

"It wasn't under your bed," Root said. "You left it drying on your bathroom counter."

I paused. "Oh," I said, but my anger was only half diminished. "Still. Do I have to lecture you like my Mama? You don't go around touching other peoples' sex toys!"

"Your mother gave you _that_ lecture?" Root asked, grinning.

"Oh, what the _fuck_ , Root." I leaned back in my chair and sighed, staring at my bedroom ceiling. I was too tired to deal with this. "Forget it."

Another awkward pause. I was just about ready to give her the riot act and kick her out when she asked, her voice whimsical, "Was it fun?"

"Was what fun?" I said.

"The Trisoft case."

I slowly sat up straight and stared at Root.

"How did you hear about that?" I said suspiciously, leaning forward.

"It wasn't Shaw," Root said. She did her little dismissive shrug. "Nobody else, either. It's just one of those things I happen to know about."

"That's creepy."

"Yeah," Root admitted. "So, really, was it fun?"

I opened my mouth, not sure what to say, and closed it again before I started catching flies. I had no idea how Root could have possibly known about our little escapade on the Trisoft case. In the end, I decided I probably didn't want to know.

(Talking to Root always gave me the impression that I was completely out of the loop.)

"Yeah," I said eventually. "Yeah, it was fun. The vibrator's pretty powerful even on the low modes, and it has different programs you can run. Feels great, but it's kinda exhausting keeping it on all day."

"So I've imagined," Root said, and there was a strange edge to her voice. "What's the battery life like?"

"Really overspecced. It lasted for _hours_ , even with the two motors. The induction charger is pretty fast too."

"Mmm." Root's eyes were focused on the device.

In the back of my mind, I was pondering just how weird it was to be sitting here talking candidly with _Root,_ of all people, about my sex toys, especially the one I'd used in a slightly voyeuristic incident that she had no right to know about. Really, it was weird that I had the patience to handle her at all. I mean, this was _Root_. Either she had calmed down considerably since I'd first met her months ago or I'd gotten used to her crazy bullshit over time, and whichever way, Finch was probably right—I really did need some new friends.

"So why are you so curious about my vibrator?" I asked, leaning back in my seat and crossing one leg over the other. I smoothed a wrinkle from my skirt. "I'm sure you could go buy or steal one right now if you wanted one. I think they hit the market a few weeks back."

Something flickered in Root's eyes and she shrugged. "Oh, you know me," she said lightly. She chuckled, nervously. "Always curious about technology."

I stayed silent, eyebrows raised. Root didn't like silence much, I'd found out. It usually got her talking. Sure enough, after a few seconds, she looked aside.

"It uses your phones to communicate long distance, right?" she asked.

"Yep."

"And at Trisoft, Shaw's phone was linked to yours, so she could control it whenever she wanted."

"Yep."

Another pause.

"What was _that_ like?"

I laughed. Root's cheeks were tinged pink. She fidgeted, shuffling her feet. "So that's what you're on about?" I said. "You want to try it out."

Root made a tiny, noncommittal shrug with one shoulder.

"I would've thought you'd want to be the one holding the remote," I said. I held up a finger. "And the answer to that is _no_ , before you even ask."

"You don't know much about me," she said.

 _That's because you're a manipulative nutcase that dodges questions and doesn't tell anybody anything half the time_ , I thought, but I kept that to myself.

"Well, you're not trying mine," I said. "I don't share."

"I know," Root said. "I got one for myself."

I threw my hands skyward, exasperated. "Then why the freaking twenty questions if you already have one?"

"I haven't turned it on yet," Root awkwardly. She pressed her legs together.

"Then you should go home, get naked, and get funky, and leave me to figure out how to undo whatever you did to my computers."

Root was looking more and more embarrassed by the minute. "I wanted to try it with somebody else. That's its _raison d'être_. They built it for two. I have enough other toys for getting myself off alone."

"I'm sure John would be happy to accommodate you," I said. Root pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and began tapping on the screen.

"John doesn't trust me," Root said absently.

"Can't imagine why," I said. I shook my head and sighed. "You know, this is the _weirdest_ conversation we've ever had, and that's really saying something. You should talk to Shaw and..." I trailed off when Root handed me her cell phone. Its screen was locked. "What's this?" I asked. I slid the lock screen aside to reveal a _very_ familiar user interface: two touch-sensitive sliders, one for each motor. Both were at zero, but the remote connection indicator glowed green.

I blinked in surprise and looked back up at Root. Her eyes were laser-focused on the cell phone. She had her hands clasped in her lap.

"You're kidding me," I said.

"I have control issues," Root said, shifting in the seat. "This is...hard for me. I have to be spontaneous, you know?"

"Oh my God," I said. I stared down at the vibrator control app. The possibilities flickered through my mind. It would be _so_ easy to literally fuck with Root right now. I could put the sliders all the way up and throw the phone across the room and watch her scramble for it. I was amazed that Root had voluntarily given me that much control. But I locked the screen before I could do anything stupid and handed the phone back. Root accepted it, visually disappointed, and tucked it into her pocket.

I shook my head. "You are— _unbelievable_ ," I said. "You don't just hand somebody something like that."

"I think I just did," Root said. I ignored the sarcasm.

"I just spent three hours unfucking the most user-unfriendly VCS on the planet," I said. "I'm not in the mood and even if I was, I wouldn't want to get all 'spontaneous' with you. I don't know you that well."

"Okay," Root said, sounding morose.

"Maybe some other time. _Maybe_ ," I repeated with more emphasis, because Root was suddenly looking a lot happier. "We'd need to talk about it first. Or ask Shaw. She's more the fuck-it-let's-fuck type."

"She's busy," Root said. "And there's a good chance she'd just turn it all the way up and leave it there."

"Yeah, well, what's to say I wouldn't do that too?"

The fantasy was amusing, to say the least. And maybe a little arousing.

"You didn't just now," Root pointed out.

"Hey, give me your cell phone, I want to check my email."

"Ha ha." Root uncrossed her legs and stood awkwardly. My eyes drifted south, but her sweatpants weren't very tight, and if she really was wearing the vibrator, it didn't show.

"Well, it's been great talking, but I should go," she said. "I'll give you more warning next time."

" _If_ there's a next time," I corrected, forcing my eyes back up to her face. "I didn't say yes."

"You didn't say no, either."

"Bye," I said pointedly, and Root left. I shook my head and sat down in front of my desktop computer, wondering if it was worth the effort to try and figure out what she'd done to it. But the dirty fantasies floating around my head were making it awfully hard to concentrate.

My eyes fell on the vibrator lying innocently on my desk.

"Fuck it," I sighed to myself. I was well overdue for a little private time...

#####


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N No smut yet, that's probably next chapter._

 _This is a side of Root we don't see much..._

 _This is pretty much how I see her avoiding things she doesn't want to deal with._

#####

Early the next morning, word came down from the ever-mysterious Mr. Finch that we had a case. I was to do a little information gathering at the Number's home in Manhattan while John tailed after her at work; Shaw would be sniffing out information at the nonprofit where our Number volunteered.

Shaw and I met at a little diner for breakfast while John loitered on a park bench a few blocks away, waiting patiently for our Number to leave her apartment. I had offered to pick something up for him to eat but he had declined, stating that he was happy with his bagel. I felt bad about the inequity, but only for a moment. We'd get our turn for boring, uncomfortable surveillance soon enough; it was just a matter of time.

The diner was a nice place; a little on the grimy side, but the smells wafting from the kitchen more than made up for it. Somebody had put quarters in the jukebox to make it croon out some old big-band tune I vaguely recalled my mother listening to sometimes while she programmed. About half the booths in the place were filled. Shaw and I were seated towards the back. We ordered immediately. I had the pre-case jitters, and all I wanted was tea to soothe my stomach, a little bowl of oatmeal, and some toast; Shaw, on the other hand, ordered enough food to survive a nuclear apocalypse.

(Where did it _go_ when she ate it?)

"...so anyway," Shaw said after the waiter left, continuing our conversation from where we had left off at the door. "Finch was _really_ annoyed. You should've seen him. He was all like—" Shaw's voice deepened and took on an obnoxiously crisp and formal tone. "'Miss Shaw, at risk of repeating myself, I feel compelled to inform you once again that my desk is _not_ to be used for that purpose.' I don't get why he was so irritated. It's not like we didn't put everything back when we were done."

I snickered. "I would've thought he'd be madder about you misusing the cables."

"He didn't find out," Shaw said. "Besides, he has a million of those. He was just upset that we used his desk for something fun. He's allergic to fun."

"Well, to be fair, I'd be annoyed too if you tried that on _my_ desk."

"Your desk is too small," Shaw said. "You should get a bigger one."

"I've been wanting something roomier." I said in a deadpan voice. "There's not a lot of room on it for my notes and books."

"That's not why I was thinking you needed a bigger desk."

I chuckled. "Maybe we could steal the one from the Cylons CEO," I said. That case had been interesting, if nerve-wracking; one of my first times infiltrating a corporate high-rise.

"I don't think it would fit into your room," Shaw said.

"It might, if we tilted it just right to get it through the door."

"How would we get it into the elevator at Cylons? That building had really tiny elevators."

"I didn't notice. I was too busy trying not to freak out."

"You did good on that case," Shaw said. "Even after things went south."

Frowning, I said, "By 'went south' I'm guessing you mean 'got chased by building security and had to steal a car and ram through a barricade?"

"Pft, that wasn't even the fun part, and we _did_ make it out just fine."

"Uh-huh," I said.

"Come on, admit it: planting the porn on the guy's computer afterward was at least _kinda_ fun _._ "

"That case wasn't too bad in the end," I acknowledged. "Root was actually helpful on that one."

"That's because she really wanted to get under your skirt." Shaw smirked and her gaze dipped downward, then back up to my eyes. "For a sociopathic emo basket case, she _does_ have good taste."

I blushed.

Our food arrived. Shaw's plate looked even more impressive than I had imagined. She dug in immediately.

"Speaking of Root," I said as I stirred my oatmeal, "she came by my place last night."

Shaw rolled her eyes, but her face quickly turned incredulous when I told her about the vibrator.

"She wanted you to _what_?" Shaw said around a mouthful of eggs.

"Yeah, that was my reaction too," I said, blowing on a spoonful of oatmeal to cool it. "She just handed me the phone and was like, 'hey, fuck me!'"

Shaw paused chewing for a second. Then she shrugged and continued eating.

"And you didn't?" she asked. She washed down the eggs with a large gulp of coffee.

I laughed. "I thought about it. But—I just don't _do_ that kind of thing on short notice."

"Except that time at Trisoft," she reminded me (as if I could forget). "And on the Princeton case. And last week at Carter's—"

"Well, yeah, but I'm _used_ to doing that sort of thing with you."

"You could've turned it on for just a little bit to make her squirm."

"I was tempted," I admitted. "But...like, when we did it at Trisoft—" (I felt a tingle of arousal in my nethers at the mere thought) "—we knew each other well, you know? I had limits and I trusted you not to push them too far. I don't know much about that side of Root. That's more your department."

"Yeah, but that'd be her problem," Shaw said. "Not yours."

"Yeah, well. I'd still feel pretty crappy if I accidentally took it too far with her."

"This _is_ the woman that kidnapped you," Shaw pointed out. "I'm formally diagnosing you with Stockholm syndrome."

"Talk with your mouth closed," I chided.

"You're dodging the subject," she said as she stuffed a piece of toast into her mouth.

"I dunno," I said. "I just feel kinda sorry for her. She's so..." While I struggled to find the word, Shaw helpfully provided some suggestions.

"Irritating, misanthropic, cute, annoying, crazy, childish, nerdy, irksome, full of shit...?"

"...sad," I finished. "And she's _really_ been trying to connect with us recently."

"Not very well," Shaw said.

"I did say _trying_."

Shaw snickered. "Well," she said, picking up a piece of bacon, "if you don't want to do it, I'd be happy to take her to a crowded park, turn the vibrator up all the way, and throw her phone into a lake." She punctuated her sentence with a crunch as she bit off the end of the bacon.

"I figured," I said.

"Okay, I wouldn't be that quick about it," Shaw said, looking thoughtful. "I'd string her along for awhile first, _then_ destroy her phone. Right in front of her. Preferably when she's really desperate. It's always fun to hear her beg."

"Uh-huh." It was amusing how quickly Shaw's fantasies developed.

"I wonder..." Shaw mused, idly twirling her bacon strip. "Since she's in such a submissive mood, maybe we could get her to wear one of those locking chastity belts with a built-in vibrator. Then she wouldn't even be able to take it off."

Arousal shivered down my spine at the idea. (I filed it away for future research in my mind.) Shaw certainly was in a mood. "I'm glad you're fantasizing mostly about doing her instead of shooting her these days," I said.

"Why can't I do both?" Shaw tried, and failed, to look innocent; the gleam in her eyes gave it away.

"I'm starting to see why she came to me first," I said, sticking out my tongue.

Shaw shrugged. "She probably thinks I haven't forgiven the whole kidnapping thing."

"Have you?" I asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Kinda. Not really."

I laughed. "She knows."

"Clever girl."

Conversation languished. We went back to our meals. I didn't have the stomach for much of my oatmeal, but I did better with my tea. We didn't speak for several minutes, until Shaw asked:

"So, are you going to take her up on the offer?"

"I haven't decided yet," I said. "It could be fun..."

"I say go for it," Shaw said. "It might help her put a little more trust in humans..." I had the impression that Shaw had been about to add something else, but she didn't elaborate.

"We'll see if she really trusts me that much," I said. "She seemed on the fence about the whole thing."

"Are you going to record this?" Shaw asked. "'Cause if you are, I want a copy. I want to hear moaning. Video would be even better."

"Perv. I doubt she'd let me, and I don't want to push her."

Shaw wiped her mouth and dropped the napkin onto her now-bare plate with an air of finality.

"Well," she said, "if it goes well, you should make her give something back for your troubles. That mouth of hers is good for more than just flirty talk, you know."

A passing waiter gave Shaw one of the dirtiest looks I had ever seen. Shaw just smiled in that creepy, unnerving way of hers, and he quickly moved on.

"I _have_ slept with Root before," I said dryly. "But I'll keep it in mind."

"Just FYI." Shaw pulled out her cell phone and raised her eyebrows. "John says our girl's on the move. Time to head out." She lazily threw a pair of twenties on the table and we left, stepping out into the cold New York morning.

#####

I didn't see Root again for a few days. The Patroski case turned out to be one of _those_ cases: a massive pain in the posterior for everybody involved, especially for Fusco, who got shot in the buttcheek. ("Not again!" he had moaned as the paramedics carted him away, which had immediately made me wonder about the previous time—or times.) I mean, the case wasn't exactly _terrible_ , not like the cases that had a lot of blood and dead people, but it was definitely _annoying_ , like the McDowell case. Sure, nobody died, and nobody besides Fusco really got hurt, but all the close shaves, and the foot chases, and the garbled calls, and the flat tires, and the puddles of vomit, and _especially_ the Number's girlfriend, who kept making passes at me both drunk and sober, all combined into one of the most aggravating forty-one hours of my life to date, only to be surpassed by the three solid days of frantic crunching before my undergraduate senior final team project had been due.

So when I finally met up with Root in the unlikeliest of places—sitting behind a dumpster along an empty service road that ran behind a rave club—I was, for once, actually not annoyed to be working with her, even if it meant I'd probably be chasing after her as she did something stupid and unpredictable in the very near future.

"Hi," I said, crouching down beside her. I was glad I was wearing disposable clothes. I had dressed casual for this case: jeans, sneakers, and an old T-shirt. I had the feeling I would need to burn the lot when the case was over. "Why are we hiding behind a dumpster?"

"Because this is the best place to get signal," Root said. "The walls are attenuating it." She was dressed much as I was. She had a netbook balanced on her lap. A pair of short black antennas protruded from a tiny box attached to the back of the pygmy computer. "I should've brought the Yagi. Then we could be up on the rooftop across the way."

"I've got the pieces for a cantenna in the car," I said. "I can run back and get them."

"Nah, the signal's stable," she said. The smell of the dumpster didn't seem to be bothering her. "It's not very comfortable, but—ah, we're in."

I pulled out my own netbook and hooked it to the box with the antennas, brushing aside tall weeds and sitting down cross-legged as best I could next to Root. The jeans didn't provide much insulation from the cold asphalt beneath my ass. I hoped we wouldn't have to stay here too long.

"You sure the garbage truck isn't going to come by?" I asked.

"Not due for another three and a half hours," she said.

I had no idea how she knew that, but I hoped it was true.

"Find their netblock yet?"

"Yep," Root said. "10.0.0/24. How unusual." Her voice was very dry. "Try .142, doesn't look like anybody's using that. I'm on .141."

"Nmap feeding you anything yet?"

"Yeah, so far looks like they've got two NAS boxes, three POS terminals, five HTPCs, and some sort of server, plus their crappy router. You want the server, I'll take the NASes?"

"Sure."

".49," she said, and I fired up nmap to look for a way in.

As we worked in silence, I found myself thinking about the vibrator and Root's strange request.

"So..." I said, not really sure how to bring up the topic. I decided for the almost-direct approach; Root tended to react to that the best. "That thing you mentioned a few days ago..."

"Oh, that?" Root said, her voice just a little too casual. "Yeah, I decided it wasn't for me."

Whatever I'd been expecting to hear, it hadn't been that. "Really?" I asked, surprised. "You seemed pretty curious."

Her fingers hesitated on the keyboard. "I changed my mind."

A feeling strangely like disappointment settled in my stomach, but I did my best to ignore it.

"Okay," I said. "But if you ever do want to try it, we can talk."

"I'm almost done with the NASes," she said. "I've set up a persistent backdoor in the router. How's the server coming along?"

I looked guiltily down at the screen; I'd barely even managed a user-level shell. I still had to get superuser access and start poking around...

"Almost in," I said.

"Try probing the Samba server, it was reporting an old version number." And it was back to the business at hand, as if I had never asked the question.

The case wrapped itself up nicely within a few hours, but the satisfaction of a job well done was tinged with the vague disappointment of Root's sudden change of mind.

#####

Several nights later, as I was installing operating system updates on some of my computers, the system tray icon for my IRC client began to flash with an incoming message. I clicked it excitedly, wondering if it was from Corvus—it'd been nearly a week since I'd heard from him.

It wasn't. It was Root.

 _« discordia» i changed my mind_

I knew immediately what she was talking about. _Wow_ , I thought, _she must be_ really _nervous._ Root wasn't one to waffle; she liked to pick a plan of attack quickly and then stick to it. This back-and-forth wavering wasn't like her.

I carefully typed a response.

 _« elev» Again?_

Her response was almost immediate.

 _« discordia» yeah, what about tomorrow?_

I raised an eyebrow and tapped my foot against the base of my chair.

 _« elev» I'm free, unless a Number comes up._

Again, her response was very rapid.

 _« discordia» probably won't get a number._

New York _had_ been relatively quiet recently on the crimefighting front recently...I wondered if Root was extrapolating based on that or if she had inside information I didn't know about.

 _« elev» As long as nobody needs saving, we can talk._

 _« discordia» k_

 _« elev» I mean, we could chat about it now if you're not busy._

I waited, but this time, no response was forthcoming. Figuring she might need a little encouragement, I continued typing.

 _« elev» I just want to make sure we're on the same page, what you want, what your limits are, etc._

 _« elev» Do you have anything specific in mind?_

 _« elev» Some particular scenario, or just messing around with the thing?_

 _« elev» If we decide to go forward after we talk, we can play with the toy in private first to get used to it._

I waited a bit and then switched windows to resume the operating system updates, deftly resolving a package conflict from a custom repository by switching it back to the main updates repo. Fifteen minutes later, I glanced down to the corner of my screen and saw that the IRC indicator was still grayed out; Root had never written back. Her IRC client hadn't gone idle, she was active...but not responding.

 _« elev» You there?_

I waited, and I waited, and then I waited some more, but Root didn't write back that night.

#####

I set my alarm to go off a little earlier than usual, though not by much. Root was a morning person, but I wasn't about to sacrifice my sleep for her, especially since she was being kinda nebulous about this whole thing.

After I woke, I went about my morning routine, fixing tea and breakfast. While I waited for the water in the kettle to boil, I sent Root a text message.

 _When do you want to meet today?_ I wrote. _Anytime after 9 is good for me._

She didn't write back.

I kept the phone near me throughout the morning as I incrementally approached decency, starting with a shower, then getting half-dressed; I forgot to put on a top because one of my friends chose that moment to blow up my IRC client with frantic messages begging me to help her regain access to the server she'd just locked herself out of. I spent the next half-hour walking her through setting up the out-of-band networked KVM, logging in locally, and editing firewall configuration files from the console. When I was done, it took me a few seconds to realize why my shoulders were so cold.

I finished dressing and checked my cell phone. Nothing from Root.

I went back to my computer.

Finally, just shy of lunchtime, my cell phone buzzed. I typed a quick _brb_ to the IRC channel where I was talking with friends and picked up the phone to read Root's reply.

y _eah, something came up, sorry can't meet today_

I frowned.

 _You sure you want to do this_? I wrote back. _Because you're being kinda antsy._

Her response came quickly.

 _yeah just not today ok_

 _ok_ , I wrote back, once again trying not to feel too bad about the letdown.

#####

The next night found me curled up beneath my quilts with a sci-fi novel in my hands and a cup of decaf tea sitting forgotten next to the cell phone on my bedside table. It'd been awhile since I'd gotten my teeth into a good book; most days I didn't have much time to read before bed, or I was too tired to do so. But earlier today Shaw and I had staked out a used bookstore in Queens, and I just hadn't been able to resist buying one of the few Heinlein books I didn't already own; I'd spent the rest of the day looking forward to reading it when I got home, even if it meant waking up later the next day.

I was a good chunk of the way through the book—there were more pages behind me than ahead—when my cell phone made a gentle chime. Curious—I thought I'd enabled my do-not-disturb app—I marked my place in the book, reached for my phone, and checked the screen. There was an incoming message from Root.

 _eMotion pair request verification._ _You're almost done!_ _To finish_ _adding_ _your device_ _to your_ _eVibe_ _network_ _,_ _log in to_ _the_ _eMotion app, ta_ _p_ _the configuration icon, and select_ _your paired device_ _from the list..._

I squinted at the screen. Had Root really just tried setting up my phone as a remote for her vibrator? Before I could finish reading, another message popped up.

 _share_ _pin is 1337_

 _i'm_ _at a coffee shop, theres only a few people around_

 _just dont start it too high ok?_ _i hear its pretty powerful_

It took me a few seconds to process this information. When I realized what Root was trying to get me to do, I sighed and set the book down, then pulled up her number from my contacts list. The phone rang just once before she answered.

"Did you set it up yet?" Root asked tightly. I had never heard her sound so nervous. She was almost whispering.

"Root—" I began.

"I don't see your phone in my device list yet—"

"Root," I said.

"—but there might be some latency from the server and—"

"Samantha."

Root fell quiet immediately.

"I didn't pair it," I said.

"Why not?" Root demanded.

"Because you've been skittish and nervy about this thing for like a week."

A nervous scoff. "I don't know what you mean."

Was I really going to have to spell it out for her?

"You're scared of actually having somebody holding the remote," I said, "so you keep psyching yourself up until you get all impulsive enough to do it. Then you freak and back out."

"I'm not backing out this time," Root said defensively. "I want to go through with this. Just pair your phone already."

"Okay, two things." I ticked them off on my fingers, even though she couldn't see it. "First off, no. Second, it's—" I checked my alarm clock "—freaking _midnight_. What on Earth are you doing in a coffee shop at midnight with a vibrator in your knickers? How is that in any way sexy?"

"Come on," Root pleaded. "You know I have to be spontaneous about this."

"You mean impulsive."

"Close enough."

It occurred to me then what she had said: _I_ hear _it's pretty powerful..._

"Have you even tried turning it on yet?" I asked suspiciously.

"...no. I was saving that for when somebody else had the remote. First time, you know?"

Irritating or not, I had to hand it to Root: she had way more self control than I would _ever_ have.

"Then I'm _definitely_ not pairing my phone."

"But _Lizzy_...!"

I ignored the use of my most hated nickname. "Root, trust me. It'll be a lot more fun if you're not freaking out before you even turn it on. You should try it in private first, even just for a few minutes. That's what Shaw and I did."

"But—"

"You _do_ trust me, right? And be honest, 'cause if the answer isn't 'yes', you might as well send that fancy pair request to random people on FriendZone. You'll get the same amount of enjoyment out of it."

The answer was a long time coming. For several seconds, I wondered if the call had been disconnected.

"...yeah," Root said quietly. "I guess. I mean, you're not as untrustworthy as everybody else, so there's that."

Coming from Root, that was about as good as I was going to get.

"Then how about this," I offered. "We'll try it at one of the apartments. Nobody else will be around. Just you and me, and if you don't like it, we'll never have to talk about this again. Okay?"

"But that's boring," she complained.

"But that's _safe_ ," I corrected.

"That's what I said."

"Take it or leave it," I said. "If you want more excitement, call Shaw." When she hesitated, I added, "Look, I think this could be really fun for both of us, but I don't want to push you into doing something you're uncomfortable with. I just think it'd be better to start slow, and if you're willing to do that, I'm game. If not, you need to find somebody that cares less. Okay?"

"...okay," she said after several seconds.

"Let's talk tomorrow," I said. "You don't have to decide right now."

"I already know what I want to do," she said.

"Good, tell me tomorrow. 'Night, Root."

"...'Night. And thanks."

"Sure thing," I said, and I hung up.

 _Jesus, what a pain in the ass_ , I thought. Yet I couldn't help but feel just a tiny bit affectionate.

I was curious what decision she had made, but at the same time, I didn't want to get my hopes up too far. I distracted myself by going back to my book. Within minutes, I was back aboard a starship, and thoughts of Root were light-years away...

#####


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N I hadn't intended there to be this much smut in this chapter. I got about halfway through writing it when the plot took off in an entirely unanticipated direction, and instead of fighting it, I was just like, "Okay, more smut it is!" I'm feeling out of touch so this may not be my finest work, but hey, there's naked people having fun, so whatever._

 _More chapters to come, this isn't the end of the story. I have some plot points planned out to guide me. Feedback welcome!_

#####

After breakfast the following morning, I called Shaw to see if we had a Number for the day. Probably not, since I had woken up on my own time around 9 o'clock and the calls for cases tended to come earlier than that, but I wanted to double-check.

"Nope," Shaw said. "John's called dibs if one comes in. Poor guy doesn't know how to relax. Got any plans for the day?"

"Well..." I said, idly turning my half-filled teacup a few degrees at a time, "I was going to try the thing with Root today, assuming she doesn't change her mind _again_."

There was a pause, just short enough to make it hard to tell if it was cellular delay or Shaw hesitating.

"Oh," she said. Her voice was just a little too casual—Shaw's brand of disappointment was subtle, but still discernible. "Well, have fun."

"We'll see how it goes. She might freak again."

"Can I at least lurk in the background somewhere? I want to watch her squirm."

"Maybe if she decides to go out in public," I said. "Don't worry, I'll give you all the dirty details later. How about over dinner sometime? It's been awhile since we've had a nice night out."

That seemed to brighten her mood.

"Sounds good," she said. "I think I'll go to the range. Been awhile since I've shot the Barrett. Finch is such a wet blanket about guns these days."

We exchanged good-byes and I hung up. Taking a soothing sip of tea, I leaned back in my chair and browsed through my phone's contact list until I found Root's number. I was just about to push _send_ when the phone buzzed in my hand.

Root really had the eeriest sense of timing.

"Hi," she said when I put the phone to my ear. Her voice was soft and nervous, bereft of its typical flirtatiousness.

"Hey, Root," I said. "I was about to call you."

"I know. That's why I called first."

"Right." I had no idea if she somehow actually knew or if she was just trying to be creepy, but it wasn't very important either way. "So, what do you want to do?"

She didn't answer right away. I waited patiently until she said, "I want to try it. Where did you have planned? 94th street loft?"

I allowed myself to feel the tiniest amount of excitement, but I wasn't going to get my hopes any higher than that until she actually showed up.

"Yeah," I said. "I can be there at 11."

"Okay," she said, and she hung up.

#####

I arrived at the apartment building—a three-story brick structure encrusted with flowing ivy—a few minutes before 11. The exterior entrance was an aging metal door recessed into an alcove next to a defunct hardware store. I opened a crooked, weather-stained telephone wiring box in the alcove and entered a code into the keypad within. The door clicked open. Inside was a quiet hallway and a staircase that led up to a second door and another keypad, this one in plain sight. I tapped in a different security code, rolled my eyes at the little security camera mounted next to the door, and stepped into the apartment.

The loft was an expansive open-air space of hardwood floors and brick walls thirty feet to a side. The frosted skylights and ceiling girders were two stories above my head and the arched windows towered eight feet tall. Two ceiling fans, suspended at different heights, spun lazily. Wide black couches surrounded a glass coffee table in the center of the room. Along the back wall, a massive plasma TV sat atop a long, low cabinet containing AV equipment.

Over in the corner to the left was my favorite feature of the apartment: a reading niche. Tall wooden bookcases, all neatly lined with vintage hardcover science fiction and fantasy books, had been set up along the walls, and several comfy, plush maroon chairs were just _waiting_ for somebody to sit down with a good cup of tea, kick up their feet, and bury their nose in a book.

On the opposite side of the loft was a freestanding serving bar and a modern kitchen, replete with chrome fixtures and appliances. Nearer to me, a polished wooden staircase ascended to the balcony that overlooked the living area. At the top of the stairs was a compact office area, which Root had claimed months ago as a home for an excessive amount of computer equipment. Past that was the "bedroom"; the balcony widened to accommodate an armoire and a _heavenly_ queen-sized bed.

The place was surprisingly cozy despite its size. Sounds did not reverberate much even with all the hard surfaces; tall acoustic panels of various sizes were mounted along the walls and patterned throw rugs helped absorb sound as well. Automated shades on the windows and skylights could be closed with the touch of a button, giving the loft a more intimate feel.

Despite it being on a relatively busy street, the apartment was well protected from prying eyes and ears—Finch had purchased the buildings on either side (because of _course_ that was something Harold Finch would do), and the old storefront at the ground floor was perpetually "closed for renovations". Considering the way Shaw, Root, and I liked to unwind after hard cases the privacy was welcome.

I could get _really_ loud.

After I had taken off my shoes, I went through the apartment to make sure nobody else was around—a paranoid habit instilled by John, but one I followed dutifully—and then grabbed a book from the bookshelf and sat down on the couch to wait.

Root showed up at 11AM on the dot and let herself in.

"Hi," she said, closing the door behind her.

"Hey." I looked her over. Root was wearing a pair of jeans, a long-sleeved gray cardigan over a white top, and short leather boots, the last of which she kicked off at the door. She had her arms crossed, as if she was cold, but I realized that she was cradling herself.

"To be honest," I said, "I was expecting you to change your mind again." I motioned to the spot next to me on the couch. Root hesitated and sat down. She made an abortive move to cross her legs, but then pressed them together instead.

"I almost did," she said, putting her hands on her knees. Her leg couldn't seem to stop fidgeting. "I was thinking about it on the way over."

"If you're that nervous, we don't have to do this," I said. "But I think it'd be fun to give it a shot."

"Yeah," Root said. She glanced at me and then down at the couch. "You know, you've had so many opportunities to literally screw me over. I was expecting revenge for the kidnapping thing."

"I think we're pretty much even, considering Shaw took your clothes and left you zip-tied to a—"

" _Yeah_ , that," Root said, and a dreamy little smile came across her face. "That was actually kinda hot."

"Uh-huh," I said dryly. Root chuckled, but the nervous sound quickly pattered out and left the room draped in awkward silence.

"Um, so," I said, "there's a couple of ways we could do this. I was thinking we could start here in private, and then if you're comfortable, we could go out in public later. But we don't have to go out if you don't want to. I guess it really depends on exactly what you're after."

"The meaning of life and a semblance of order among the cold chaos of the universe?"

" _Root_ ," I said, rolling my eyes. "I meant with the vibrator. Like, when I did it with Shaw, it was...well, kinda _thrilling_ to wear it in public without anybody else knowing. So going out and about was a big part of it. But so was Shaw holding the remote. Which part turns you on?"

"I—" With a frustrated sigh, Root looked aside. "I hadn't thought about it much. It just seemed really hot when—when I heard about it, you know?" She motioned vaguely with her hands. "Both things, I guess. Having somebody holding the remote, not knowing when they're going to turn it on...the _anticipation,_ and knowing they could make you come at any time, and you can't do anything about it. And nobody around you can tell what's going on unless you blow it."

"You really do need a partner you can trust with something like this," I said. "Just because they _could_ really doesn't mean they _should_ , unless you agree to that kind of thing or something."

"Yeah. And I...trust you." Root looked like she was confessing to some heinous crime. "On this one thing, I mean," she clarified, just a little too hastily. "I wouldn't give you the encryption keys to my laptop or anything like that." Her face took on a faux look of seriousness. "Confidential information. You understand."

"I trust Shaw," I said, amused, "but she doesn't have the passphrases to _my_ hard drives either."

"Your weird porn is safe," Root said.

"Hey, girls in suits are _not_ weird," I said, indignant. "You're the one that goes on about tentacles!"

Root shrugged. "Back on subject?" she asked with a wink.

I was amazed that my eyes hadn't stuck in the back of my head yet, given how much I rolled my eyes around Root.

"All right, how about we try it in here first?" I said. "Baby steps and all that. We can decide later if you want to go out."

"Okay," Root said, and her leg started wiggling again.

"Are you, ah, wearing it already?" I asked. "You're pretty squirmy."

"Yeah," Root said.

"Okay. I'll pair it and show you what the app looks like." As I spoke, I fished my cell phone out from my skirt pocket. Root watched with anticipation and curiosity as I fired up the application and scrolled to the pair request screen.

"That doesn't look like my app," she said nervously. "Mine has way more pink and blue."

"This is a pet project," I said, not without a certain amount of pride. "I didn't like their UI, so I wrote my own. It uses the same API calls to their system as the real app. Not that they documented those very well."

"I bet it took a lot of 'experimentation' to figure them out," Root said. Her voice had regained some of its usual seductive lilt, but it couldn't mask the nervous waver.

I gave her a brief grin and returned my attention to the screen. Within seconds, I had accepted the pair request Root had sent the night before. I switched back to the main interface and showed her the various screens and operating modes. On the main screen were the manual control sliders, one for the vaginal probe and one for the clitoral vibrator. Another screen allowed me to control both at once by dragging my finger along a 2D graph, with each axis corresponding to a different motor. A tap mode translated momentary touches into bursts of speed, and a preset menu allowed for "set and forget" modes, including sound activation.

I made sure to draw Root's attention to the big emergency stop button at the bottom.

"Every screen has it," I said, tapping it. (It didn't do anything, since the vibrator wasn't on yet.) "Just in case, you know?"

Root nodded.

"If I didn't know what it was, I'd say it looks like any other app," she said. "I suppose that was the idea?"

"Yeah," I said. "It's not exactly subtle to use an app with giant pink accents in public. This is more generic. I'm still working on it. It'll look a _little_ less hackish when I'm done."

"Right."

"So..." I held out the phone to her. "You wanna try it out?"

Root reached for it, but she hesitated and drew back her hand.

"No," she said. "You do it."

I raised an eyebrow. "You sure?"

"Yeah. Turn it on."

Root had her hands clasped tight in her lap. Her leg was wiggling again and she looked like she was bracing herself for something painful. There was no way she was going to have any fun in that state.

"What, just like that?" I said, grinning. I set the phone on the coffee table. "No foreplay or anything?"

"I have to be spontaneous, remember? I—"

I was getting really tired of hearing her spout that word. This was ridiculous. How was she supposed to have any fun if she had to trick herself into using the toy?

 _Well_. If she really wanted spontaneous...I could do spontaneous.

Root made an undignified yelp when I grabbed her shoulders and shoved, using my weight to push her over and force her down against the pillows. She ended up sprawled on her back. I straddled her leg and knelt over her.

" _You_ ," I said cheerfully, prodding her chest, "need to relax first." Her shoulder was a knot of tension beneath my hand.

"I'm relaxed!" she said. I was far from convinced. "I really am!"

"I'd really hate to see you when you're all wound up."

"Very funny," she said, rolling her eyes. But she didn't resist as I bent down and planted a soft kiss on her cheek.

"Root," I said, squeezing her shoulder in reassurance, "you're safe here. We have all the time in the world to figure out what you want to do."

"I know," she said, and now it felt a little more genuine. I felt the muscles in her shoulder gradually slacken. A mischievous grin appeared on her face as she reached up, took a fistful of my blouse, and yanked me downward towards her waiting lips. I stumbled at the sudden change in balance and my knee nudged between Root's legs. She let out a soft gasp as the inert vibrator jostled against her body. I liked the sound. I liked a lot of sounds Root made. She was a veritable jukebox when it came to making sexy noises during lovemaking.

"I've been waiting," she said when our lips parted. "For like a week. Haven't touched myself at all."

"You should see a doctor." I left a trail of kisses down her cheek and neck. "Nobody should go without orgasms for that long. It's unnatural."

"You have nooooo idea how horny I am," she whined.

"It'll be worth it," I promised. A moment later, I felt Root's hands creeping up under my blouse, warm and soft against my chest and back. I allowed my hands to roam as well, running them all along Root's body.

When Root's probing fingers started fumbling at my bra, I figured she was comfortable enough to have a little more fun, so I disengaged myself as gently as possible and felt around for my cell phone on the coffee table. Root pouted when I pulled away, but her expression turned to a combination of excitement and nervousness when I held up the phone.

"Gonna start it nice and slow," I said. "Ready?" She nodded. Carefully, I used a finger to drag the slider for the vaginal probe up an inch.

Beneath me, Root moaned softly.

" _Oh_ ," she said, flexing her fingers. "Oh, wow." She laughed and brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. "That feels great."

"See?" I said, smiling, "it's fun." I pocketed the phone and returned my attention to Root. My hands slipped under her shirt and rubbed along her chest and sides.

"How high is it?" she said.

"Not very," I said. Even so, the vibrator was already having an effect; Root's hips were beginning to move of their own accord as she tried to get a little more stimulation out of the device. "I didn't even turn on the clit vibe yet."

"You should do that," Root said.

"In a bit," I said. Root's hand moved downward towards her nethers. I grabbed her wrist and made a tsking noise.

"Not yet," I scolded. Root made an inarticulate whine in the back of her throat and tried grinding against my leg. "We have all day to look forward to."

"I should've gotten one of these a long time ago," she panted.

"Having fun?"

"No, it's like watching paint dry. C'mon, turn it up. I want to feel what it can do."

"We should probably move upstairs first," I said. "We'll have more room on the bed."

"Yeah."

I helped Root up off the couch. Her knees wobbled and she leaned against me, although I was pretty sure it was just to cop some extra feels and not because she actually needed the support—the vibrator definitely wasn't running at "jelly legs" speed yet. Root ran her hands over my torso, pawing at my breasts as we stumbled up the stairs. I wasn't sure who was leading who; the only certainty was that we'd be getting there together. My fingers found the button on Root's jeans as we passed through the office area. We paused just long enough for her to shimmy out of them, leaving her in the tight blue panties that held the vibrator in place. They were practically dripping.

It should've been illegal for somebody to have that much self control.

When we neared the bed, Root's hands withdrew from my blouse and made a grab for my shoulders, no doubt intending to force me down like I'd done to her in the living room. But somewhere in the back of my mind I'd been anticipating the move; I held onto her arms, using our combined momentum to ensure we went down together. We ended up facing each other side by side.

"Nice try," I said. I pulled out my cell phone, intent on adjusting the vibrator. Root took advantage of my distraction. Moving quickly—much faster than I would've expected in her state—she rolled on top of me, straddling me and pinning my arms against my sides.

"You know I like to be on top," she said, grinning.

 _But I still have the remote,_ I thought gleefully. Keeping my eyes fixed on Root's, I allowed myself a tiny smirk before I used my thumb to flick one of the virtual sliders up as far as I could get it. The response was near instantaneous. Root's eyes went wide, she let out a startled shriek, and her hands shot to her crotch. That was my opening. A little roughhousing and a tap on my phone screen later, I was on top of her and the vibrator speed was back on low.

"You wanted someone else in control," I said, smiling down at Root. Her hair was all mussed up from our struggle and it spilled across the soft sheets. I liked the look; it was much better than her always-perfect waves, especially when paired with the smoldering desire in her eyes.

"Only if they work for it," she grumped. "Also, that was a dirty trick. Was that the clit vibrator?"

"Yep. And I thought playing dirty is the whole reason we're here."

"Yeah, okay, sure," Root allowed. "Can you turn it up now?" She squirmed ineffectually beneath me, although I was pretty sure she could dislodge me if she _really_ wanted to. "Just not that high!" she added quickly.

"Only if you ask nicely," I said.

"Turn it up."

I laughed. "Try again."

"Turn it up, nicely?" She tried giving me The Smile, the one that somehow managed to disarm Shaw from time to time. It had no effect on me. Root's hips wiggled as she tried to grind against the vibrator, but she met only air.

"Who's Nicely?" I asked. "Don't know anybody named Nicely."

"You know, you're a smartass sometimes."

"Pot calling kettle. Come on. I know you know how to say _please_."

Root set her mouth in a firm line, raised an eyebrow in challenge, and said nothing.

So that was how it was gonna be, huh?

Challenge accepted.

I might not've known Root that well, but I _had_ learned a few of her weaknesses. Maintaining eye contact as much as possible, I slowly worked the hem of my top upward a few inches at a time, dawdling when I got to my bust.

"You can make it easier on yourself," I said sweetly. "Just say the magic word." Root didn't respond, but her attention was wholly focused on me.

I pulled the top over my head—quickly, in case Root decided to stage a coup while I was distracted—and threw the garment aside with a casual flick of my wrist. I didn't care to see what it landed on. (I found out later I'd managed to toss it right over the balcony—smooth.) Root's eyes drifted southward. I took my sweet time unhooking my bra, and by the time I had flung it aside as well, Root was unabashedly staring at my chest.

Sucker.

"All you gotta do is ask," I said, leaning down and throwing in a bit of jiggle for good measure. Root fidgeted beneath me. The haughty look on her face was already starting to falter. I rubbed the inside of her thighs, moving my hands in small circles and letting my fingers drift close to her groin. "Just ask..." I crooned.

I pushed up Root's top and nuzzled her stomach, teasing the skin between my lips while my hands continued to massage her legs. Her breathing quickened and turned into feeble moans, especially when I started working my mouth towards her panty line.

Root's panties were drawn tight around the rounded shape of the vibrator, holding it securely in place over and within her intimates. Its power light glowed faintly through the fabric. Every once in awhile, I made sure to "accidentally" press against the vibrator. The first time, Root let out a strangled groan. The second time, she eagerly leaned into it. I let her have a few seconds before I took my hand away.

The third time, she broke.

"Turn it up," she whispered.

"You know what you have to say," I said. She held out for a few more seconds, and then, finally, gave in.

"Please," she choked out.

I grinned. Triumph was mine, and quicker than I'd been expecting—Root must've been _really_ desperate.

"Now was that so bad?" I said.

Root let out a despondent whine when I took my hands and mouth away. It turned into a breathless gasp when I turned on the clit vibrator.

"Oh fuck," she groaned. She spread her legs wider and clutched the sheets. "Ohh—"

"Hits the right spots, doesn't it?"

She nodded, her eyes fixed on some faraway point above us. Her hips gyrated, rising and falling like waves as she tried to press against the vibrator. Holding up the phone, I used the app's momentary mode to give both vibrator motors a quick burst of speed. I was rewarded with a startled gasp and Root's hips fell back to the bed. Her thighs trembled and her fists clenched.

Switching modes on the app, I stroked the phone screen, teasing the vibrator speed up and down. Root's eyes tracked my fingers.

"That's...very low latency," she noted, her voice breathless. "Really sexy."

I couldn't help but laugh—of _course_ Root would focus on something like that. Giving both motors a little boost, I enabled one last mode and pocketed the phone again.

"Turn it up more?" Root asked.

"It'll go up by a random percentage every minute or so," I said. "So you might be coming in a few minutes...or an hour..."

Shaw probably would've paid big bucks to see the look of consternation on Root's face. "Don't worry," I said, "I'll help you along a little." I crawled further up Root's body and straddled her waist, lowering myself until I felt the buzz of the vibrator weakly through my skirt and panties. It didn't have much of an effect on me, not with all that fabric in the way, but the extra pressure pushed the toy harder against Root, eliciting a keening moan that was doing it for me far better than the muffled vibrations from the toy. I set up a slow, gentle rhythm, rocking my hips back and forth to grind against the vibrator. Root moved her body with mine to get just the right amount of pressure, and soon, our bodies had synced in a graceful, undulating pattern.

Suddenly, the vibrator began to buzz harder, and Root let out a startled gasp.

"Looks like it's your lucky day," I said, surprised. The vibrator didn't usually accelerate that quickly. Root didn't say anything. Her mouth was ajar, letting free a continuous series of moans and gasps, and her eyes were wide, flickering between my face, my breasts, and the ceiling. Her arms wrapped around me, her fingernails pressing into my back as she desperately pulled me closer.

It wasn't long before the vibrator kicked itself up another notch. I doubted Root was going to last much longer. Her body trembled and her fingernails dug into my skin. My lips found the junction between her neck and shoulder and I bit, nowhere near hard enough to break the skin, but enough for Root to shudder with delight.

"Oh fuck—" she gasped. I bit again. "I'm—Ellie, I'm gonna— "

Her body quivered with tension. Her eyes squeezed shut, her mouth fell open, and for several seconds, all I heard was her gasping for breath. She twitched and spasmed and her grip tightened, forcing me desperately against her. We rode out her orgasm together, until she let out a long, shaky moan and began to squirm beneath me.

"Fuck— _fuck_ —" she said.

"Having fun?" I whispered in her ear.

"I came," she gasped out. Her voice was a high-pitched squeak. "Oh fuck! _Fuck_! Turn it down!"

I briefly considered leaving the vibrator like it was, or even turning it up a few notches. If it'd been Shaw and her fucking multi-orgasmic body (I wasn't jealous, at all), there would've been no question—I would've cranked it up, because okay, maybe I was a _little_ jealous, and I liked hearing Shaw swear and yell when her body kept going and going, but we'd talked about it and she dug it when that particular boundary of hers was pushed a little, so it was okay. But Root's body was in the same camp mine was, which meant that without ropes to hold her down, I was probably going to get kicked across the room very soon, and our tenuous relationship probably wouldn't fare much better. So I quickly fished out the cell phone and turned the vibrator down to a gentle purr, just about the level that I could stand after a good orgasm.

Root's breath came in little pants and her skin was flushed. Her top, dampened with sweat, clung to her curves.

" _Wow_ ," she said, propping herself up on her elbows. "That was great."

"Sounded like you were having fun."

" _Much_ better than watching paint dry," she said. She let her head flop back against the sheets.

"Another go?" I offered, holding up the cell phone.

" _No_ ," she said. "I'm through."

With a smirk, I tapped the _stop_ button on the app and watched Root's body relax. Setting the phone on the bedside table, I laid myself down next to her, running my hand over her chest. She leaned into the touch, edging closer to my body.

"I'm not sure which is hotter," Root said. "You having the remote or all the technology that makes it work."

"Definitely me," I said. "I'm miles better than Bluetooth, HTTP, SSL, Java, and GSM all put together."

"I dunno," Root said, her voice playful and innocent. "I think it's a close race."

"Oh hush," I said. But coming from Root, that might've actually been a compliment, an acknowledgment that a human being could hold some measure of status next to her beloved computers. I supposed I was honored.

We laid there for several minutes, not saying anything until Root abruptly spoke.

"I want to try it on the town next time," she said. "Let's do it tomorrow?"

"Sure," I said. "If you're comfortable, I mean. And if we don't have a case."

"There probably won't be."

Once again, I found myself wondering how Root could say that so confidently. But I dismissed the thought when Root snuggled closer and put her arms around me. When it came to precious days off, days to fuck and cuddle and not get chased by angry people with guns, I was willing to take whatever I could get.

#####


	4. Chapter 4

#####

 _A/N: I rewrote this cursed chapter a zillion times before giving up. Now that this one is out of the way though, the next one is already half written._

 _Poor Root! How is Ellie gonna salvage this one?_

#####

The enjoyable afternoon didn't last long. About one o'clock, Root's pants started buzzing, and not in the fun way. She sighed into the crook of my neck and snuggled closer, as if she could make the phone disappear by ignoring it. But the phone continued to buzz; eventually, Root rolled her eyes and got out of bed. She padded over to the office area, searching through the pockets of her discarded jeans for the damnable device.

"Case?" I asked as she tapped the screen.

"Uh—kinda," she said. She tried to cover up her hesitation with one of those charming smiles. "I have to go. Duty calls."

"Can I help?"

"This one's a little out of your league," Root said. "Need to kidnap an FBI agent and stuff. Might need to borrow some of Sameen's C4."

"Do I even want to know?" I asked dubiously.

Root gave another smile—this one more devious—turned, and headed downstairs to the bathroom, leaving behind only the fading ghost of her body heat beside me in bed. Muttering dark things, I got up and hunted around for my clothes.

By the time I made it downstairs, Root was gone.

I loitered for awhile. Made myself a sandwich for lunch and browsed through the bookshelves. But there was little for me to do at the loft, so eventually, I left. On the way home I stopped at my favorite bodega to pick up a few groceries and goodies. (I didn't like taking things from the lofts, even though Shaw assured me that they were stocked regularly. I liked being at least _kinda_ self-sufficient these days, you know?) While I stood in line behind the guy chatting with the cashier, I sent Shaw a text message:

 _Dinner tonight? You pick the place._

I paid for my items and headed home. Shaw didn't respond until after I'd put the groceries away in my messy kitchen and settled down in front of my desktop computer.

The phone buzzed on my desk and a message appeared: _Raincheck :( Number came in_ _an hour ago_ _, dumbass accountant_ _again, guess which one_

Snickering, I typed back, _Need help?_ So much for a nice dinner and a relaxing evening. But I rarely turned down a case—when I was offered a choice, anyhow.

 _No,_ Shaw replied. _Lots_ _of_ _guns_

I was disappointed, but also relieved—I'd been shot at a _lot_ recently, and it was wearing on my nerves.

She sent a second message a moment later: _I can snag_ _a rifle_ _for you, they're nice Mini-14s ;_ _)_ _didn't your mom want_ _another_ _one for her collection?_

 _lol_ _not sure if she'll want street guns, but thanks_ _,_ I wrote back. My fingers hesitated over the phone screen, and then I tapped out, _Be safe,_ _ok_ _?_

Months ago, I would've expected a snarky reply, like "Aww but I was planning on taking lots of risks", or "There's safe and then there's _fun_ ". Or maybe even no response at all. But a few seconds later, Shaw's response came through.

 _You got it,_ she said. I smiled and put the phone down.

With Shaw and Root both busy, I was left with little to do for the rest of the day. I decided to program. There were a few modifications I'd been wanting to make to my control app for the toy. The one at the top of the list was a time-delay system. See, part of the fun of the thing was the anticipation; not knowing when the person holding the remote was about to kick it on. But taking somebody by surprise was hard when you were with them; the sight of you taking out your phone was a pretty good hint that something exciting would probably be happening in the very near future. Not always—taking out the phone and making random taps and swipes on an unrelated app could be a good mindscrew, especially if they were in the middle of a conversation with somebody else—but the fact remained: to change the state of the toy, the phone _had_ to be out. I wanted to make the app a little more flexible than that.

So I grabbed a legal pad from my desk drawer and started doodling down ideas. I soon had the algorithm for a delay queue system—I could capture a command or gesture and have it activate at a later time. It was simple enough to implement; the programming language already had a data structure that could handle a command queue. All I had to do was add a recording system and implement a background thread that would occasionally process the queue and send the commands to the server.

It took about two hours to get everything implemented. The code was an awful hack; all sorts of hard-coded constants and copy-pasted functions that really should've been refactored into something nicer, not to mention all the weird work-arounds I had to throw in to make my code interface with the company's server. (For example, sometimes the command just wouldn't take on the server; I had to send it multiple times until it was acknowledged.) But it wasn't like anybody else was ever going to see the source, so I wasn't too broken up about it. Someday I'd tear everything out and write my own client/server code anyway; then I wouldn't even have to use the crappy server, giving me the extra bonus of having complete control over every aspect of the system from endpoint to endpoint.

I tapped my foot impatiently against the base of the chair while the app compiled and loaded itself onto the phone. Once the home screen was finally up, I switched the app over to tap mode, set a delay of 10 seconds, and touched the screen several times. And then I waited.

Ten seconds later, the vibrator buzzed on and off in the same pattern that I had tapped on the screen.

I grinned. This was going to be _fun_.

#####

The next morning, I got a text message from Root. As usual, it arrived right when I was about to call her. She had another thing coming if she thought I was going to buy her innocent "coincidence" story yet again.

 _11_ _o'clock,_ the message said, _at_ _the park near your place?_ _Plenty of stuff to do nearby._

The park was easily within walking distance, which made me happy because it was an unusually lovely day out. The cold front that had been hanging gloomily over New York for the past week had receded, giving the city a brief respite of pleasant autumn sunshine.

As I strolled down the sidewalk beneath a canopy of red and gold leaves, I sent Shaw a text.

 _Doing the thing with Root. I'll fill you in later. ;)_

Her response came within seconds:

 _i_ _want sexy details,_ _pix plz?_ _if you_ _get_ _vid_ _I'_ _ll_ _buy you chocolate_

I chuckled and pocketed the phone.

A few minutes later, I arrived at the park entrance. I didn't notice Root at first. I was too busy looking for jeans and a dark, long-sleeve top, her usual outfit. (Shaw sometimes described it as "killer emo chic".) There were a few women dressed like that nearby, but none of them had Root's build, hair, or face. Many of them were wearing shorts, skirts, or dresses to take advantage of the unexpectedly good weather. The ones that weren't looked nothing like Root.

I did a full 360, looking around to see if I had somehow missed Root. It was the wavy hair that finally made me realize the woman messing with her cell phone over by the lamppost was _her_.

"Hey," I said, walking over to Root. "You look nice."

Root didn't wear skirts often; she was like Shaw, preferring more practical clothes that could take a few tumbles, survive a scuffle or two, and yet still allow her to blend in almost anywhere. But today she was wearing a simple black skirt that fell to just above her knees, a dark red cardigan over a plain gray top, and black tennis shoes.

"It's more convenient for what we're doing," she said coyly, letting the skirt swirl. "And the weather's so _nice_ today."

"Yeah," I said, looking down the path beyond the park entrance. The dozen or so people enjoying the park seemed to agree. Hopefully they'd be focused on the nice weather and not Root's squirming. "Got any plans?"

"Not really," she said. She shrugged. "Maybe do some window shopping or something, catch lunch. I thought it'd be good to start small, like you said."

"We can do that," I said. "Let's head towards the stores?" I nodded towards the park entrance. On the other side of the park was a small shopping district. Root shrugged and we ambled off down the path, winding our way between arching oak trees.

Root stayed quiet. Somebody that didn't know her would say she looked relaxed, but I could see the tension in her shoulders and the tightened lips.

"You're allowed to talk, you know," I teased after a minutes or two. "I haven't turned on the sound activation yet."

"I'm terrible at small talk," Root said.

I scoffed. "You told me all about how you posed as a secretary at the CIA for like, a month. You totally had to have made small talk then."

"Yeah, well, those blowhards expected unintelligent sound bites from a bimbo in glasses." Root rolled her eyes. "It's harder with smart people. 'Nice weather we're having' is so cliché."

"Well, it _is_ nice weather. Gotta enjoy it while it lasts. Soon we'll be back to eight-hour stakeouts in the snow."

"Just leave the stakeouts to John," Root said. "He likes that kind of suffering—anything for the greater good. Kind of like you, but not nearly as hot."

As we got near the pond at the center of the park, we passed a couple lying on a picnic blanket spread across the sunny grass. A little further on, a woman sat painting before an easel, her hair as fiery as the leaves of the trees she was painting. Root gazed at the painting as we passed. I wondered if she had a thing for art; it wouldn't be the first time I'd found out something unexpected about her.

I heard the sound of skate wheels moments before two shapes blurred past us, a girl and a boy on inlines. Root flinched. The kids zoomed ahead of us, a bluster of leaves fluttering in their wake as they glided towards the bubbling fountain at the center of the park.

Root was looking more and more anxious by the second. I figured we should move on to the fun part before she got cold feet. I looked around. Nobody was within a few dozen feet of us—perfect.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out my cell phone.

"Oh, look at that," I said playfully, "I got a text." I tapped on the control app and waited for it to boot.

"Not too high!" Root whispered, eying the kids skating around the fountain in the distance.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said as I set a thirty-second delay to activate both vibrator motors on low. "I'm just chatting with a friend." Root tried to look at what I was doing on my phone but I turned away, saying, "Hey, private conversation here!"

Root's expression turned exasperated, then worried. She gulped and glanced over her shoulder, no doubt making sure nobody had crept up on us within the past few seconds. But her worry turned into confusion when I slid the phone back into my pocket without turning on the toy. An eyebrow went up, but she didn't say a word. I wondered what was going through her head right now.

I began a mental countdown.

"Anyway," I said, putting on my best poker face, "what were we talking about?"

"We were being stereotypical and discussing the weather," Root said, bemused. "It's nice. The sun is shining, birds are singing, _et cetera_. I honestly don't get why the weather is such a popular conversation topic."

"We could talk about the secret case you got yesterday instead. What'd you get to do, hack the Pentagon?"

"Something like that," Root said. She looked less nervous now, more relaxed. "And no, before you ask, I didn't get to use the C4."

"That wasn't what I was planning on asking," I said.

"I must be spending too much time around Sam _eeeeee_ _n_ _—!_ "

Root's voice quickly gained two octaves before it cut off in a gasp. Her knees twitched inward. Her hands reflexively moved down to her thighs before she realized that grabbing her crotch was going to invite some strange looks from the people around us.

"You...you added a time delay," she said, sounding dazed. She couldn't seem to figure out where to put her hands. She settled on crossing them awkwardly.

"Uh-huh," I said, grinning widly. "Just for you. Feeling fine?"

"Yeah," she said, brushing a non-existent strand of loose hair back behind her ear. "Yeah, I'm just— _wow_. Are you _sure_ nobody can tell?"

"You're not buzzing," I said. "And I'm sure you're just blushing because you're standing next to someone as attractive as me."

"Right," she said, her voice regaining a little of her dry sarcasm. "I'm sure that's it." She took a deep breath and let her arms fall back to her sides. "Seriously, has anyone ever been able to tell when you were wearing yours?"

"Had a couple of near misses," I said. "Was in a really quiet office with a guy—he thought it was my phone. And then Carter thought I was ill, no thanks to Shaw messing with the buttons."

Root looked concerned. "We aren't planning to visit the Detective today, are we?"

I laughed. "Don't worry. I'm not as mean as Shaw."

Root's gait was surprisingly steady as we neared the park exit. We hurried across the street to an open-air shopping district, a quaint brick-laid plaza dotted with trees and gardens. The place was bustling, though not overly so. I could see the gears turning in Root's head as she looked around: crowded was good, because it provided plenty of background noise to mask unwanted noises—but it also provided lots of witnesses to potentially awkward behavior.

"Relax," I reminded her. "Nobody can tell. Even I can't."

"Right," she said.

"Hey, didn't you say a few days ago you needed a few new SSDs?" I asked, nodding towards a nearby electronics store. "I mean, they'll cost an arm and a leg or two at a place like that, but you can just make Finch pay for it."

"Sure, if they even have them in stock." Her dubious expression made it clear that she wasn't enthused about going into the store. It was clearly a tourist trap, judging by the cheap brands they had advertised in the windows. Root rolled her eyes. "I'll probably end up with some knockoff from Elbonia."

"If that happens, you could always write a bot to spam their Yelp page with bad reviews."

Root looked contemplative as we stepped into the store, greeted by a wave of cool air and a wall of sound. It was crowded and noisy inside, the latter thanks to the hard linoleum floor and open ceiling. A group of teenagers was clustered around a display for a game console, admiring the lurid violence and high definition gore, and shoppers browsed up and down the narrow aisles. I could tell immediately that most of the merchandise ranged from trash to passably low-end, although some of it was still usable—there were a few decent video cards, for example, and at least one liquid cooling kit for a dual-GPU gaming rig. Most of the good stuff was locked behind glass.

I watched Root as she examined the signs hanging above each aisle. I'd been exaggerating a little when I'd told her that I couldn't tell that the toy was having an effect on her. Most people would've assumed it was her complexion, but I knew that the rosy tint to her cheeks and ears was unusual, as was the distant look in her eyes and the way she awkwardly shifted her weight from side to side when she stood still. It was _hot,_ especially since I knew exactly how she felt right now—I'd been in the same position before.

We wandered down the aisle with the hard drives. The solid state drives were behind lock and key along with a few other higher-end products.

"I'll go find somebody to unlock it," I told Root, and before she could protest, I slipped away.

As soon as I was out of sight, I grinned and pulled out my cell phone. I didn't change any of the toy settings right away, of course—that would've been too predictable. But by the time I returned with an overly-enthusiastic sales clerk in tow, I had the app all fired up and ready to go.

"Hey, I hear you're looking for SSDs," the clerk said to Root. "Looking to speed up an old computer?"

"Something like that," Root said, her voice all innocence and syrup, but I could hear the distracted waver behind it. "You got any mTech 800s?"

"Hmm...doesn't look like it," the clerk said as he scanned through the items on display. "How about a nice StoraStar instead?" He pointed to one of the more expensive boxes in the case. _500_ _for only 250 gigabytes?_ I thought. _For that price, i_ _t'd better make me breakfast and_ _get me off_ _while I work_ _._

Discretely, while Root's attention was focused on the clerk, I put my finger on one of the sliders for the vibrator motors and twitched it upward.

"I dunno," Root said. "That's awfully— _ah_! _Expensive_!" The syrupy tone was gone, replaced by something that sounded almost like a squeak. Root's knees knocked together and she made a terrible-sounding fake sneeze into her elbow. I fought back a snicker as she leaned against the display case for support.

"Bless you," I said, keeping my face straight.

Fortunately, the clerk was super dense—or maybe he was too focused on the prospect of a sale.

"Yeah, it's expensive," he said. "But what price can you put on _performance_?" He made a dramatic gesture towards the display case. "If you've got a slow computer, a solid state drive will make it seem like new again."

This time, I bumped _both_ sliders up a few notches. Root gasped.

"I know, right?" the clerk said, completely misinterpreting her reaction. "It's like magic."

"I just need more s-storage space," Root said, her voice tight. "What's the biggest one you have?"

She shot me a dirty look while the sales tech dug around in the display case for another box. I shrugged, putting on my best innocent face.

"Here you go," the clerk said. "The StoraStar—"

"Great, I'll take it, thanks," Root said quickly, grabbing the box out of his hand without even looking at it. "I think that guy over there needs your help."

When the sales clerk looked over his shoulder, Root slipped off towards the cash registers. I smirked and followed.

"Impatient today, are we?" I said as we stood in line.

"Bite me," she said, sounding more than a little out of breath. "Preferably more than once."

"You doing okay?" I said.

"...yeah, but don't turn it much higher," she whispered.

"I'll give you a break when we get outside," I promised.

Unfortunately for Root, there was only one line and it was rapidly queuing up behind the world's slowest cashier. It was amusing watching Root's face slowly get redder and redder as she shuffled her legs, practically dancing in place. After a few minutes, I decided to have mercy and I turned both motors down to a soft purr. Root visibly slumped in relief.

When we got outside, she finally looked at the device she'd bought.

"...$500 for _this_? Really?" She wrinkled her nose.

"I guess you should've spent more time shopping and less time flirting with the sales guy."

"Fuck you. I'll have you know, _s_ _omebody_ was distracting me." She turned the box over, looking at the list of specifications on the back. "This thing should've cost half that, at most."

I put a hand to my heart, feigning shock. "But—but what price can you put on _performance_?" I said in my most serious voice, and it was enough to make Root laugh.

"Okay, fine, whatever," she said, rolling her eyes. She dropped the box back into the shopping bag. "Can we skip to the part where you bend me over a table already? I'm _really_ horny right now."

"Jeeze, you're even more impatient than Shaw," I said. "I guess we know who has more stamina."

"I dunno," Root said, her eyes innocent and wide. "Maybe one of these days we should, ah, compare. You know me. I _love_ data."

I snorted. "Let me know when you get Shaw onboard with that. In the meantime, why don't we grab lunch? I've heard that place over there is good, and they're not too busy."

Root eyed the open-air cafe with distaste but followed me anyway. The waiter seated us at a table for two beneath a wide red umbrella. A fountain bubbled sedately nearby. I watched Root out of the corner of my eyes while I pretended to skim over the lunch menu. There was something delightful about the way she shifted and squirmed in her seat, her knees pushed tight together but her feet planted apart.

If she thought she was horny _now_ , she was going to be totally desperate by the end of the day. I idly considered blackmail ideas. Maybe I could do what Shaw had done to me. _S_ _ure,_ _Root, I'll_ _let you get off, but_ _only if you_ _wear a_ _—_

The waiter arrived, interrupting my fantasies. While the young man told us about the daily special, I stealthily reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, thumbing to the pattern-tap screen on the app. I waited until the man had turned to take Root's order, my fingers poised above the screen.

"I'll have the—the—"

I tapped out a little rhythm on my phone and Root's voice crept up in pitch as the vibrator pulsed with little bursts of speed.

"-ch-chicken sa-sandwich," Root said. Her hands quickly migrated down to her lap, where she clasped them tightly together.

"Of course." The waiter, if he noticed anything amiss, didn't comment on Root's strange behavior or steadily reddening face. "And a drink?"

This time, I held my finger down on the screen for several seconds.

"I-iced tea!" Root blurted out.

The waiter turned to me. "And you, ma'am?"

"Oh, I'll have the same," I said. "Thank you so much." I handed him back the menus—Root seemed strangely reluctant to take her hands out of her lap—and he walked away.

"You are a _jerk_!" Root moaned. I gave her my best "who, me?" face and shrugged. With a quick swipe, I turned the toy off and slipped the phone back into my pocket.

Oh yes, tonight was going to be fun. If Root was this desperate _now_ , I couldn't wait to see her once we got back to the apartment. I could ask her to do just about anything and she'd probably do it.

Maybe I'd take Shaw's advice and put that mouth of hers to use.

Root was looking around nervously, eying the people at the tables nearest to us. Her back was ramrod straight, her hands were still clasped tight in her lap, and she was blushing even harder now, if that was possible.

"Okay," she said in a strangled voice, "I'm getting close. Turn it down."

"Uh, I did," I said.

"Turn it down more," she hissed through gritted teeth.

"It's _off_."

"No, it isn't!" Root's voice was quickly gaining pitch.

Confused, I opened up the app on my phone. It didn't take a genius to figure out what was going on.

"It, uh, crashed," I said.

" _What_?"

I tapped the app icon again. The main window popped up, froze for a second—and promptly crashed again. A cold feeling sank into the pit of my stomach.

"We...might have a problem," I said slowly.

" _Fuck_ ," Root whispered harshly, her eyes wide, like a deer. " _Might_ have a problem? Turn it off!"

"I—" Every time I started the app, it immediately crashed. To make matters worse, even the original vendor app was crashing now too. "Use your phone!" I said, but Root already had it out, her trembling fingers tapping furiously on the screen. Whatever she was doing wasn't working, because she suddenly sprang up, knocking her chair aside, and stumbled towards the cafe entrance. Heads turned and people muttered.

"Is she okay?" a couple near our table asked.

"I'm—I'm sure she's fine," I said hurriedly. "Upset stomach probably. I'll, uh, I'll go check—"

The waiter at the kiosk pointed me towards the restroom at the back of the cafe. I reached for the door just as it opened and Root came out. For a moment, we stared at each other.

"I'm leaving," she said, her voice flat. Without waiting for a response, she pushed me roughly aside and headed out the back door. I stared after her, then down at my phone.

"Shit," I sighed.

#####


	5. Chapter 5

#####

 _A/N FF ate my formatting again. Oh well._

 _Poor Ellie. What a rough life._

 _Shaw might be getting in on the fun next chapter or two..._

 _I'm going to update my stories on Sunday from now on, work permitting!_

#####

As soon as I got back to my apartment, I went to my bedroom, not even bothering to kick off my shoes at the front door, and fired up my desktop computer. Grabbing a micro-USB cable from the disorganized pile of clutter I had mostly contained to one side of my desk, I jammed one end into the phone and the other into my computer, then opened a terminal window and told the development debugger to dump the logs from the phone.

It didn't take long to scroll down near the end of the system log and find the stack traces from when the app had crashed. I copied the error messages over to a waiting text editor and then opened my development environment on my second monitor. While waiting for it to load the project, I opened a terminal window and sent Root a brief apology via IRC:

 _[ elev]_ _I am *so* sorry about what happened today. I'm going to figure out why it crashed, ok?_

She didn't respond. By then the development environment had brought up all my files for the vibrator app. I examined one of the stack traces.

 _NullPointerException_ , I thought. _Gee. My favorite_. _At least I have a line number._ I growled and opened up the relevant files, digging down into the network event handling code.

It took a half-hour to determine that there were actually multiple problems with my code. For starters, all but one of the crashes recorded by my phone had been caused by an out-of-order packet, a piece of information that shouldn't have been processed until _after_ a session handshake had taken place. As soon as the phone had connected to the company's servers, it had been drowned in a bunch of speed-change packets instead of the registration packet it was expecting. It looked like the company's servers were attempting to resume the previous session instead of starting up a new one like it should've been doing—I had never tested an unclean shutdown of the app, so I'd never caught this weird behavior.

About the time I discovered that one, I got my response from Root:

 _[ discordia] ok. i'm busy._

And that was all. I sighed and went back to work, looking for other problems. And there were plenty of problems...

The receiving buffer for the network stack was too small, making the app crash when it received a lot of packets in a short amount of time. That had caused the very first crash, which had caused the initial disconnect, which had caused all the other crashes as the phone had tried and failed to reconnect to the company server.

Last, and most annoying to track down, was the cause of the extreme number of packets from the server. Turns out it was staring me right in the face: the crappy hack I had written to force the server to accept commands by sending them multiple times. During testing, I'd sent each command twenty times. Apparently the company's server took that as a license to send up to twenty responses. I'd thought I'd commented out the test code and reduced the final retry count down to three, but nope, that was definitely a twenty, and I was definitely a dumbass.

 _And people wonder why QA is important,_ I thought forlornly.

The fixes weren't complicated, but it took me awhile to implement all of them; I was dragging my feet. I didn't see the point. I was pretty sure I'd just scared Root off for good. But I forced myself to complete them anyway; at least Shaw and I could have fun with the fixed version of the app.

A few minutes after I had kicked off the script to package up the fixed version, Shaw called.

"Details," she said as soon as I picked up. "You promised sexy details."

"I thought I trained you with better phone manners," I said, leaning back in my chair.

"Hi, Beth. How's the weather? Hack any government agencies today? Now tell me about you fucking Root."

"I screwed up," I sighed. "The app crashed and left the vibrator stuck on. I made a bunch of really stupid coding mistakes."

"Oh. That sucks. For you, anyway. Did she come? Did you get video?"

"I dunno and no. She bolted after she got it shut off."

"Aww. You sound glum. Hey, I know what would make you feel better."

"What's that?"

"Cheeseburgers. You can tell me the story better on a full stomach. I'm thinking barbecue bacon burgers from Fontaine's."

Shaw probably could've heard my stomach rumble over the line. I glanced at the clock. It was almost dinner time—the place was sure to be packed. "We'll have to wait forever for a seat."

"Finch's bank account says otherwise. We have a reservation at seven thirty for the nice shadowy booth in the back."

Despite my melancholy mood, I couldn't help but chuckle. "You have way too much fun spending Finch's money."

"I can neither confirm nor deny. See you there?"

"It's a date," I said. "But you'd better order your own damn curly fries this time. I'm not sharing."

#####

Fontaine's was less of a restaurant and more of a time machine. The place was all retro, done up in Art Deco style—gold and silver everywhere, brash geometric patterns, elegant and elaborate light displays, all that jazz. Cozy booths with deep maroon cushions lined the walls. Towards the back, the lights were dimmed down a little lower, each table a pool of illumination cast by a retro chrome lamp hanging down from the dark ceiling. Naturally, Shaw had chosen the darkest table, way back by the hallway that led to the bathrooms and the emergency exit. The place was packed, but somehow no one had picked that one table.

Shaw must've called ahead, because our plates came within minutes of our arrival.

"So, today didn't go well?" Shaw asked. Her eyes were on me, but her hand, with a life of its own, crept towards my plate. I shooed her hand away, but not before it made off with a french fry, which she popped into her mouth with a satisfied smirk.

"You could say that," I said, stabbing into my burger with my knife. "I made some stupid, _stupid_ coding mistakes. Like, first-year CS student kind of mistakes."

"And the toy got stuck on high?" Shaw said. She leaned forward eagerly, resting her chin on her hands. "I need _details_. Was she squirming? Moaning?"

"It got stuck on, dunno how high," I said. "Then the app kept crashing when we tried to get it shut off...in public."

"I wish I could've seen her face," Shaw said. She took a huge bite out of her burger.

The vision of Root's panicked face popped into my mind. My stomach churned and I shook my head. "It wasn't very funny. She was kinda freaking out."

Shaw paused chewing, then shrugged, bobbing her head. "She _really_ doesn't like not being in control." She pouted. "There go all my fantasies."

"Well, I sure didn't help with that today," I said.

"Cheer up," Shaw said. "You have food and you don't have to pay for it." She smirked and took another big bite out of her burger. For awhile, we ate without speaking, basking in a comfortable lull of conversation. Shaw devoured her burger in the time it took me to eat barely half of mine. What with the way she was staring at the other half, you'd think she was regularly starved.

I eventually plopped the remainder of my burger on her plate, just to make her cut it out with the puppy eyes.

"I still feel guilty," I said eventually, twirling a curly fry absentmindedly in my ketchup cup. "I mean, those were some _stupid_ mistakes I made, and now I probably scared her off."

"Did you fix the bugs for next time?" Shaw asked.

"I think so. Once I found them, it was just a few lines to tweak." I leaned back against the thick seat cushions and stared up at the ceiling. "But I dunno if there's going to be a 'next time'. She seemed pretty mad."

"Well, maybe she'd feel up to it again if it was, uh, tested better," Shaw said with a very straight face. "You know how she swoons over high-quality software. We just need to make sure you worked out all the, ah, kinks."

I laughed. "I love it when you talk dirty. And I think you mean worked _in_ all the kinks..."

Shaw grinned and made off with another of my fries.

#####

"I'm just sayin'," Detective Fusco said as Detective Carter pulled their Crown Vic neatly up to the curb and cut the engine. "What's got Glasses' panties in a knot? What'd we do to piss him off?"

"Dunno," Carter said. "But he sounded worried and we were in the neighborhood."

She peered out the windshield, scanning the quiet nighttime street. Most of the old townhouses were dark, save two: the one next to the squad car and the one across the street and down one unit, although the only light coming from the latter was a dim glow from a TV upstairs.

"Yeah, but checking a noise complaint?" Fusco said. "Seriously? Last week it was 'run this bullet through ballistics', 'look up this license plate', 'help us catch the crazy cat lady with the AK-47'. Felt like I was doing something useful, you know?"

Detective Carter sighed and shrugged. "John probably left somebody gift-wrapped for us. Finch _did_ say it was important we got here before anybody else..." She shook her head. "Let's just get this over with." She pushed open her door and stepped out into the night, walking around the car to join Fusco on the sidewalk. Together, they made their way up the steps to the front door.

Exchanging looks, they stood on either side of the entrance. Carter put one hand near her holster and, with the other, tried the door handle. It was locked, so she gave the door a few solid thumps.

"NYPD!" Carter called. "Open up!"

They waited, ears straining for the slightest noise. Carter counted to ten, slowly, then pounded on the door again. This time, they heard low voices and muffled footsteps.

"About time," Fusco grumped as the door swung open. He blinked. "Oh, great. _You_."

Carter's eyes were immediately drawn to the _very_ expensive-looking maroon silk bathrobe Shaw wore. Yet despite its quality, it was a poor fit for her tiny frame; the robe was obviously meant for someone larger. It was also heavily wrinkled and the sash was tied with a sloppy, loose knot, as if it had been put on in haste.

"Hello, Lionel," Shaw said, somehow managing to make those four syllables sound extremely dangerous. Her attitude towards Carter was much more genial. "Hi Carter. How are you?"

"Shaw," Carter said cautiously. Her hand relaxed, moving away from her pistol. "Neighbor across the way said they heard somebody screaming at this address."

"Did they?" Shaw asked, unsurprised and unperturbed.

"Yeah." Carter peered over Shaw's shoulder, but saw nothing out of the ordinary in the entryway. From what she could see of the apartment, there was no signs of a struggle; no blood, no wrecked furniture. "You torturing somebody in there?"

"Nope," Shaw said.

"...did you hear any screaming?" Carter asked patiently. Next to her, Fusco rolled his eyes.

Shaw shrugged and leaned against the doorframe, but she said nothing, staring lazily at Carter with an expression of boredom. The detective held Shaw's gaze until a woman's voice drifted from deeper within the apartment.

"Shaw!" came the petulant voice, "Hurry up!"

"Is that Elizabeth?" Carter asked.

"Yep," Shaw said.

"...is she okay?"

"Yep," Shaw said.

"I'm fine, Carter!" came Elizabeth's voice again. "You can go now!"

A tiny smirk tugged at the corner of Shaw's mouth, but she stayed stoically silent.

"Ah," Carter said. She nodded, a look of understanding slowly spreading across her face. She raised an eyebrow. "Well. Uh. You two have a nice, _quiet_ night, okay? If dispatch gets another call at this address, I'm not answering it."

"Sure. I'll keep her quiet. Guess not all the neighbors are on vacation after all."

"Uh-huh," Carter said dryly.

"Thanks, Carter. Owe you one."

And with that, Shaw closed the door in their faces.

"What was that?" Fusco sputtered, motioning to the door.

"Think about it in the car," Carter said. "It'll come to you."

It did, about five minutes later, and the look of horror on his face was well worth the awkward conversation with Shaw.

#####

I waited a few days before contacting Root again, in part because I didn't want to be pushy and in part because I was too busy breaking into corporate offices and being chased by angry men with guns. (You know—business as usual.) Some knuckleheads who had no sense of business at all had made the regrettable decision of launching a startup in Manhattan. One of them starting embezzling, skimming a little here and there, until their lead-programmer-slash-accountant, Laura Taylor, stumbled on the secret and innocently went to one of the other business partners, who then put a hit on the first business partner, who then put a hit on Laura.

It took a lot of legwork to keep Laura and her young daughter out of their clutches, but in the end, they were safe and sound, blissfully unaware of the danger they had been in. Sure, Laura lost her job (fortunately, because the FBI started investigating the startup the next day), but she was quickly picked up by mTech, who paid her much more handsomely than her previous employer. So it all worked out.

That case kept me busy for a couple of days. I didn't have time to contact Root, or so I told myself. But when a morning without Numbers finally came, I found myself still hesitant to call her. It just felt too awkward. So instead, I loaded up my IRC client and, after some thought, sent a simple, if blunt, message:

 _[ elev] Hey, I fixed the bugs._

And I waited. When I didn't get a response within thirty seconds, I deliberately switched windows and found myself something else to do. I wasn't going to check for a response until I got a notification alert on my taskbar. Not even once. I could resist.

It's not like I was nervous about how this conversation was going to go or anything like that.

(Naturally, I forgot and alt-tabbed to the window a few times.)

When Root wrote back a few minutes later, her response was just as terse as mine.

 _[ discordia] that's nice_

That was it. Not even a hint of curiosity at the root cause of the bugs. It was clear that she wasn't going to respond much more than that, so I sent another message.

 _[ elev] I'm really sorry about what happened. It was stupid to use an app I hadn't tested very well._

 _[ discordia] it's ok_

 _[ elev] I totally get if you're not interested anymore._

I gulped and typed out the next line.

 _[ elev] But I was thinking...if you still want to try it..._

 _[ elev] Maybe we could meet sometime and go over the app code together. That way you know_ it'll work right.

 _[ elev] Heck, why don't we write our own server backend? Then we don't have to use their crap servers. We could design our own protocol._ _Make it more robust._

I waited, anxiously tapping my fingers against the keys. When the wait stretched on, I started to worry: had I pushed too far, too soon? I shouldn't have been so forward. Despite my occasional irritation at all the dumb things Root did, I valued our weird-ass friendship, and I hoped I hadn't put it on the line.

I let out a long, relieved breath when she finally wrote back.

 _[ discordia] that could be fun_

 _[ discordia] yeah, actually that does sound fun_

 _[ discordia] tomorrow? 94th street?_

 _[ elev] Sure._

 _[ discordia] bring your vibrator too ;) we'll need to test our changes._

 _[ discordia] and since your code caused the crash, i think it's appropriate you do the all acceptance testing... :D_

#####

Root had the crappiest posture when she was coding. She leaned in close to her beloved laptop, her shoulders hunched, one leg tucked under her knee and the other danging off the edge of the dining room chair, her toes brushing the wooden floor. She mouthed out wordless syllables as she encountered each line of code. Or maybe she was cursing; it was hard to tell.

"I know I said it once already," she said, "but this _really_ isn't your finest work."

"I wrote most of it when I was horny," I mumbled.

"Like right now?"

"Not _this_ horny," I said, squirming in my chair. Root had gleefully turned the vibrator in my panties on low almost as soon as I'd gotten in range of the apartment, and she'd refused to alter the settings as we worked on the source code. It was driving me nuts, especially with the random variations she'd enabled. My body was flushed with warmth and tingling desire. I was having a hell of a time focusing on the source code in front of me.

Root made a disapproving sound and jabbed at her laptop screen, not quite making contact with the surface. "You nested eight function calls on this one line. I had to split and indent everything to make sense of it."

"I might've abused autocomplete a little bit."

"So that's why you have a thirty-nine character variable name here?'"

"It's what the IDE suggested! It was easier to press _tab_ than it was to come up with a good name." My fingers slipped on the keyboard, and somehow an entire line got deleted. Swearing under my breath, I mashed _Ctrl-Z_.

Root squinted at her screen. "Why did you put everything into a global object?"

"Because it was faster to write it that way," I grumbled.

Root looked like she wanted to make another comment, but she kept it to herself. Didn't stop her from rolling her eyes though. "Fine. It looks like you got all the bugs out at least. I'm gonna finish up the protocol handler for the new server. Then we can... _test_ it." Her voice dropped to a menacing purr for the last sentence and I trembled in anticipation.

"You do that," I said. _Like, within the next few minutes, please?_

It took considerably longer than a few minutes, or at least it felt like it did. Maybe Root was being obnoxious and programming slowly on purpose. Or maybe my sense of time was thrown off by the device purring away between my legs at a level that was just enough to be arousing but not nearly enough to get me off. I made barely any progress on my part of the codebase. My fingers were having a hard time obeying my brain, I could hardly focus for more than a few seconds, and every so often I would drift off into fantasies about Shaw. And Root. And Shaw _and_ Root.

Was it just me, or was it getting warmer in here? Root didn't seem to notice. Or maybe she had. Maybe that's why the wide neck of her sweatshirt left one shoulder practically bare, showing off her delicate neck and pale shoulder, and the sweeping curves that linked them both.

I didn't realize I was staring until Root turned to me and gave me a coy grin. I blushed (harder than I already was, I mean) and tried to force the images dancing before my eyes to get out of the way of my code.

That didn't go very well.

"Well, there's most of protocol," Root said after a torturous ten minutes or so. "Enough to get us running. Tests for the server module passed. Because we actually _have_ unit tests now." She fixed me with an exasperated look.

"I was going to implement them later..." I said.

"Right. How's your code coming along?"

"I—um—" I stared helplessly down at the source code on the screen before me. It might as well have been written in some alien language.

"What's the matter?" Root cooed. "Having trouble concentrating?"

"Just a little bit."

Root smirked. "Oh well. Here, come take a look at my server code."

I shifted my legs to stand, but the movement made the vibrator press tightly against my body. I sank back into the chair, gasping.

"...can you come over here instead?" I asked.

Root tapped her chin, pondered briefly, and said, "No."

Grumbling, I forced myself out of the chair and made my way over to Root, using the table for support. But _damn_ , the sensations radiating from between my legs felt nice! I had half a mind to jump Root then and there. I wanted to feel her fingers in my hair and her hand down my—

"All the test cases pass," Root said primely, pointing to a list of green check marks. "It even successfully paired with your device."

"That's great," I said, peering over Root's shoulder to look at her screen. The top half was a function callback for the powerOn event. Judging from the function list on the right, Root had implemented about two-thirds of the major callbacks. Her neat, concise code looked like goddamn poetry. I never could understand how she could make my code look like such a hack.

"Here, why don't we give it a spin?" she said.

"Wait a second," I said, leaning closer to the screen. "I don't think you filled out the event handler for the powerOff—"

With a devious smile, Root tapped the _enter_ key once.

"Oh!" I gasped. My knees buckled as the vibrator suddenly sped up. "Oh-h fuck."

"Huh, you're right," Root said innocently. "I forgot to implement the shutdown methods. Oops. I guess you should do that before you come too many times."

"I—I don't think I can program right now—" I said. My legs trembled and I had to use the back of Root's chair to support myself.

"That's too bad," Root said sweetly. She stood up slowly, sensually, and motioned to the chair with a lazy gesture. I collapsed into it immediately, my fingers gripping the edge of the table. "We don't have any way to turn it off remotely until you implement the right functions, and I don't feel like writing any more code right now." She leaned in closer, whispering into my ear. "Now, normally this'd take you about five, maybe ten minutes, but when you're horny, and _distracted_..."

She ran her hand up my thigh and under my skirt. Her touch was like fire.

"...it might take you a little longer."

I stared at the code, not comprehending a single statement. What language was this, even? What were all these function parameters for? Root hadn't commented the code very much. I scrolled through it, trying desperately to ignore the pleasure building inexorably within my body, the warmth spreading outward from my core like wildfire. I focused on the code. Just one line at a time—I could do this.

I began to type—and gibberish came up, because my fingers kept missing the home row. I forced myself to type slowly, accurately. Root, who had moved behind me, wasn't helping much. In fact, putting her hands up my T-shirt wasn't helping at _all_.

But I somehow managed to get most of the missing logic in place.

Then the vibrator, which apparently still had the randomization enabled, started buzzing even harder, and I knew I was screwed. My hands clenched into tight fists and my knees knees knocked together, my feet jammed outward against the chair legs.

"Ooo, somebody's getting close," Root said. "I love hearing your moans. Don't hold back on my account."

"Fuck," I whispered. "Oooh-oh fuck!"

"Aww, you were almost done, too!" Root said. "You only have a few lines left to write."

But I could hardly hear her. The sensations from the toy were overwhelming, making my body sing with pleasure. I squeezed my eyes shut and clenched the bottom of the chair like it was the only thing tethering me to the planet as the orgasm washed over me, leaving me breathless and dazed.

"Oh fuck," I moaned, squeezing my legs tight together. "Turn it down!"

"Mmm." Root lounged lazily in the chair next to mine, one leg crossed over the other. "Can't. Sorry."

" _Root_!"

"I love it when you yell my name," she said. "Come on, you're literally almost done."

"Fuck you," I gasped. Root just smiled innocently and pushed the laptop towards me.

Typing had never been such a chore. My fingers kept shaking and spasming, and focusing on the screen, let alone remembering and implementing the API we had drafted, was next to impossible with the constant stimulation. Every time I got close, the IDE flagged some sort of runtime error or another, and I had to go back and tweak the logic, all while the pleasure began to build a second time.

"Ooo, I think you almost have it," Root said.

I took her word for it, desperately mashing the _compile_ button. The build process crawled on, until, after a small eternity, it succeeded without errors. The server app booted up, setting up a bridge between my toy and Root's phone.

"Turn it off," I begged.

Root chewed the inside of her mouth, then shrugged and pulled out her phone, tapping the screen once. The toy fell inert. I slumped against the table in relief, exhaling shakily.

"Not bad," Root said cheerfully.

"You suck," I said once I felt like I could talk again, but it was without malice.

"That's not very nice," Root said. There was a pause. I squeaked and jumped, nearly knocking the laptop off the table, when the vibrator kicked on low again.

"Root, what the fuck?" I gasped. Root had her cell phone out again and was tapping at the screen.

"We're not done yet," she said, her eyes gleaming with mischief. "I just didn't want to tire you out all at once. You still have six functions to fill out." She grinned. "Finish them and maybe we'll forget about last week's little glitch. Get typing..."

#####


	6. Chapter 6

#####

 _A/N: This one's a bit shorter. I was torn between posting the longer version with the smut at the end and this one, but I'd rather focus on the dirty bits so you'll get a high-quality update next week. :)_

 _Player 3 has entered the game!_

#####

Root could be surprisingly patient when she put her mind to it. The sales clerk that had cornered her over by the wall of hard drives just wasn't getting the message. I could overhear snippets of conversation from my hiding place behind a rack of CPU coolers and case fans; the guy kept trying to upsell her a new six-terabyte hard drive from mTech, but Root kept insisting that she needed _speed_.

"But it's plenty fast!" the guy said. "Says right here on the box: SATA-III, six gigabytes per second!"

"Okay, first, that's giga _bits_ per second," Root said. "Second, that's wire speed. There's no way spinning rust is going to get near that. I just need a SSD!"

Poor Root. She looked like she wasn't having a great time. With a little grin, I took out my cell phone and sent her a few commands that would improve her mood a little. (I was such a great friend.)

To her credit, Root hardly even moved when the toy sped up a few notches. She was getting good at controlling her surprise. But I still saw the way her knees twitched inward, and it wasn't long before she started squirming.

"Can I help you, ma'am?"

I nearly dropped my phone in surprise. Another salesman had snuck up right behind me. What was it with these people? Were they part-ninja? Obviously, not all of them were as dumb as the guy who was still trying to convince Root that the hard drive was superior to the SSD because it was _bigger_. At least Root had managed to pry the SSD from his fingers and now clutched the prize tightly in her hands.

She'd be fine for awhile at the level I'd set the toy at. I put on my best poker face and turned to the salesman, saying, "Yeah, you know, I've been thinking about upgrading to a new laptop. Could you help me find one?"

The salesman grinned, showing off a row of perfectly straight pearly whites, and magnanimously led me over to the section of the store with the laptops. While he rattled off specs and described all the advantages of various models ("And this one has a solid state hard drive, so it's much faster than the other ones!" he said; "No kidding," I replied), Root came up next to me.

I loved seeing her blushing.

"Okay, I got the drive, can we go now?" she said.

"I'm getting a new laptop," I said casually.

"What?" Root said, her voice high pitched. "But you already have—"

"Tell me about that one," I said to the salesman, pointing to the crappiest laptop within eyesight. "I like it. It's silver. The silver ones are faster, right?"

"Uh—well." He recovered quickly. "This is one of the new mTech models. Just came out last month. It's not the _very_ fastest one. That's why it's cheaper. But if you're just looking to do some web browsing and email—"

"You don't need a laptop," Root said. She was practically bouncing up and down. "We need to go."

"Don't mind her," I said sweetly to the salesman. "She's just got her panties in a twist. You were saying?"

" _Lizzy..._ " Root said in exasperation.

I made a mental note to turn the toy up really high next time she was talking to someone—I hated that nickname. But at the same time, I didn't want to waste too much time here.

"Never mind," I said. "I'll take it."

Ten minutes later, we stepped out onto the sidewalk. Well, I stepped, but Root kinda stumbled. She had her SSD (finally, a decent one) and I had my crappy laptop.

"That was fun," I said.

"I can't believe you bought that overpriced calculator!" Root said. "And can you turn it down now?"

"I dunno," I said. "You know I hate that nickname."

Root glowered and made an inarticulate noise of irritation.

"At least you finally have a SSD that isn't a piece of crap," I said. "More than I can say about this thing." I hefted the bag. "Hey, kid!" The teen who was about to pass us looked startled. "Happy birthday," I said with a grin, and then I tossed the bag at him. He grabbed it by reflex, but by then we were already past him. "There," I said to Root. "Problem solved."

"How could you be so cruel?" Root said.

"Are you talking about the vibrator or me sticking that kid with the craptop?"

"Both."

"Guess I've been hanging around the wrong people. I need better role models." We joined the crowd at the corner to wait for the crosswalk to clear. While Root fidgeted next to me, I pulled out my phone and held my finger down on the screen for a few seconds. Root yelped and fell against me, clawing at my arm for support. I chuckled, turned the toy down, and pocketed the phone again.

"That was for the nickname," I whispered, ignoring the curious looks from the people around us. Root gave me a dirty look and said nothing.

We crossed the street without incident.

"Well, where to now?" I asked, looking around. "We could go to the museum, or maybe check out the bookstore across the street."

Root opened her mouth to answer but then closed it again, her eyes traveling sideways, as if she was listening to someone speak. _Doesn't she ever take off her damn earpiece?_ I thought. Doubtlessly she was downloading orders from the Mothership, or Sybil, or Finch, or whoever it was that fed her that creepy accurate intel.

"Oh?" Root said, but it wasn't directed to me. "We're a little busy—"

A pause. "You sure? Okay." She returned her attention to me.

"How about a little field trip?" she said.

"Uh—a case? Now?"

"Won't take but a half hour," she said. "The office is just a couple of blocks away."

We took the subway. I pounced on the opportunity to play with the sliders on my phone, since the rattling, screeching subway car masked just about any noise the toy could make. Root's little gasps and convulsions, however, didn't go unnoticed. The woman sitting across from us looked particularly curious. I kept my face as neutral as possible while I pretended to play Captain Crunch Saga, or whatever the newest mobile fad was, but I couldn't entirely hide the smirks when Root made a particularly egregious noise. Fortunately for Root, the woman left at the next stop.

A few minutes later, we strolled into the building lobby. It was generically corporate: off-white walls, blue carpet, florescent lights, and a few lonely artificial plants scattered around in the corners.

I turned off the vibrator so Root could concentrate on the case.

"So what are we doing?" I asked quietly.

"Oh, the usual," Root said. "Sneak upstairs into the server room, plant a bug—wait—"

"Can I help you two?" Shaw drawled. She was dressed as a security guard. She was leaning back in her chair, her boots kicked up on the desk at the head of the lobby.

I looked around to make sure nobody was in earshot, then leaned closer and said, "What are you doing here?"

Shaw shrugged. "I was bored."

"Bored and in uniform?"

"I needed it earlier. The Number left the building a few minutes ago. John's tailing after him. So now..." She yawned. "I'm bored."

"Right," I said.

Shaw looked lazily at Root, glancing her up and down. "Your face is red," she said. She contemplated this, and then straightened in her chair, a feral spark gleaming in her eyes.

"Oh," she said. "You're doing the _thing_."

"What thing?" I said innocently.

Shaw took her boots off the desk. "Don't worry. We were nervous too the first time. Well, Elizabeth was."

"Hey!"

Root groaned and said, "Ugh, you have _no_ idea how horny I am right now. Elizabeth is a _tyrant_."

"Uh, actually, we've done this a bunch of times," Shaw said. "I know _exactly_ how you feel."

"Shaw's worse," I added helpfully.

"I feel like I'll _die_ if I don't cum soon," Root whimpered.

"I could help you with that," Shaw said, stretching her arms and putting them behind her head. "Just gotta ask. I'll even leave the taser at home this time."

"So you've forgiven the kidnapping thing?" Root said, brightening.

"I didn't say that, but tying you up and watching you struggle might even things out a bit."

Root didn't seem to know how to respond to that one.

"Aren't we supposed to be doing something?" I said when the awkward silence stretched on. "I want to get this done and go back to watching Root squirm."

"I guess I could let you two up," Shaw said. From beneath the desk, she produced two RFID badges. "Here. Caroline Turing and Grace Hopper. Hosting team."

"I don't think I look much like a Grace," I said, but I clipped the badge onto my blouse anyway.

"Maybe, but you definitely hop when you're wearing that toy," Shaw said. She leaned back in her chair. "You two have fun now."

We made our way up to the second floor and through a warren of hallways. None of the workers seemed very interested in us, which was a welcome relief. We could hear the server room long before we got to it; the deep hum from the power distribution units next door, the rumble of the air conditioner blowers, and the high pitched whine of server fans all pointed to a single, unobtrusive gray door off a side hallway. Root held her card up to the RFID reader and the light turned green.

"Should've brought earplugs," I grumbled as we stepped inside. "I'm getting sick of server rooms."

The lights kicked on overhead automatically, illuminating several rows of server racks. Massive air intake ducts were positioned above alternating rows, where the servers on either side vented hot air into a shared aisle. As we moved, I could feel cold air blowing up from some of the floor tiles. Root probably wasn't going to have the best time in a skirt.

But if she was uncomfortable, she didn't complain.

"Okay," she said, talking loudly over the din of the servers. "We need to find a server marked ny1dc4vmswgdynweb1."

"Could you say that again _slowly_?"

Root rolled her eyes.

We spent about five minutes looking up and down the rows for the server. Fortunately, they were all marked nicely with labels. Just as we found it, Root grabbed my arm and said, "Wait! Somebody's coming. Quick, back here."

She dragged me down to the end of the row and down towards the back of the room. We crouched down behind one of the roaring air conditioning units.

I made a WTF gesture at Root, who pulled out her cell phone. Her fingers flew over the surface of the screen too fast for me to see what she was doing. When she was done, we had a security camera feed of the server room.

"That's our Number," she said, pointing at the man on the fuzzy video. He was on the younger side, thin and lanky, with a curly head of hair and a tan suit jacket. "Freddy McCore. If Shaw missed him, he must've come in one of the other entrances." It looked like he was standing at the server we'd just found. I was immediately suspicious at the way he kept looking over his shoulder.

"What's he doing?" It was hard keeping my voice low enough to not be overheard and yet loud enough for Root to understand me over the rumbling equipment.

Root tried to zoom the video. It didn't give us much. But it was enough to see the external hard drive he had connected to the server.

"I think he's copying his data to the drive," Root said. "He's been working on a new encryption algorithm for an upcoming product."

"Worth a lot of money?"

"Millions."

"Should we stop him?"

"No; let's follow him and see where he goes."

He spent several minutes pacing back and forth in front of the server, still peering nervously all over as if he was being followed. Finally, he yanked the drive and headed for the door.

"Let's go," Root said, and we followed.

We kept our distance, especially on the longer hallways. Root set our pace. Sometimes we'd wait for ages after he turned a corner before following, only to catch the briefest glimpse when he disappeared around the next bend. Root didn't seem concerned that we'd lose him—she never worried when we trailed someone. But the hallways became twisty and winding, and we had to follow closer; soon we were barely a dozen feet behind him. It looked like he was headed for a staircase at the back of the building.

Suddenly, Root tapped me on the shoulder and showed me her cell phone. It was a message from Shaw.

"goons back door!"

"Stall," Root mouthed. Then she took a deep breath, put on a smile, and walked faster to catch up.

"Freddy!" she all but yelled, her voice positively innocent. "It's been forever!"

The man whipped around and stared at Root. "I don't know you," he said, and he started walking towards the the staircase again.

"Oh, don't be silly, it's me! Carol, from USC? We were in Microeconomics together."

"I don't remember you," he snapped, this time without turning around. "And I'm really busy."

Root had finally caught up with him. She got in front of him and stopped.

"But it's been like, twenty years! Let's catch up over coffee."

"Look, this is _really_ not a good time!" the guy hissed.

"But I just wanted to—" Root began. She didn't get to finish her sentence because the guy grabbed her by the arm and flung her aside. She tripped over her own feet and went down with a startled yell, and the guy turned to run—but found himself facing a _very_ pissed off Shaw, who grabbed his suit lapels and launched him face first into the wall. Then she did it again for good measure. I winced at the brutal _thump_ his head made when it put a dent in the drywall. He slumped down to the floor, unconscious.

"Are you okay?" Shaw asked as she helped Root up.

"My savior," Root said dreamily.

"You're bleeding." Shaw held Root's arm and looked it over.

"Shaw, it's just some scratches." She pulled her arm away.

"He bruised you."

"I didn't know you cared," Root said sweetly.

Shaw's jaw muscle twitched. She leveled a finger at Root. "I'm the only one that's allowed to mark you up. If anybody's bruising you, it's _me_."

"How romantic," Root said.

"By romantic you mean weirdly possessive, right?" I asked. When neither of them moved from their creepy staring contest, I awkwardly added, "Uh, we should probably get out of here before the cops show..."

"Right," Shaw said, but she held Root's gaze for another second before turning away. Behind her back, Root put her hand over her heart and mimed out a dramatic swoon. I rolled my eyes and followed her to the stairwell.

#####


	7. Chapter 7

#####

 _A/N_ Okay, so this was a little bit rushed. Next week I will be working on Feature Creep. Thanks for reading along!

#####

At the bottom of the stairs, we found ourselves in a service bay. I almost tripped over one of the "goons" Shaw had "handled". The poor kid looked like he was barely twenty.

"He'll be fine," Shaw said as she unceremoniously stepped over his prone form. "Don't want to ruin my record of five whole days since Finch complained about unnecessary violence."

"You mean besides the guy you shoved through a wall upstairs?" I asked.

"That was necessary violence."

Shaw casually shoved open the emergency exit—the alarm had been disabled, I noted in passing—and we headed out onto the sidewalk. The three of us meandered away from the building even as a police car came roaring up the street, going back the way we had come with sirens blaring.

"So what was with the Number?" I asked, glancing back over my shoulder.

"Freddy wanted more than his employer was willing to give him," Root said. "But it looks like the people he was going to sell his algorithm to wanted more as well."

"So both a perp and a victim, kinda."

Root shrugged. "The software could've done damage in the wrong hands. One of the buyers had ties to a terrorist cell."

I stared at her. "And you know this...how?"

"The usual way," Root said mysteriously. I groaned in exasperation.

We walked along as another police car raced by, followed by an ambulance.

"Well, that was fun," I said after awhile.

"Yeah," Shaw said. She was doing something on her cell phone. "You know what else is fun?"

"What?"

"This." She tapped her phone.

Next to me, Root gasped and jumped a few inches in the air.

"Lizzy!" she hissed. "A little warning before you turn it up that high?"

"What? But I didn't—" A grin spread across Shaw's face and I scowled. " _Shaw!_ Not cool! We spent hours working on the cryptography for that! How'd you break it already?"

"Oh, I didn't," she said. "I just bluejacked your phone and remote-controlled it."

Annoyed, I took out my phone and turned the toy back down. A second later, the sliders popped back up to 50% all by themselves, and Root let out a wavering moan.

"Shaw, stop it!" I said, turning them back down again.

"But it's fun," Shaw said, and a second later the toy was back on again.

"Don't make me turn off my phone." Now the toy was off.

"You are such a killjoy." Shaw turned it back on. Root was starting to make really interesting noises.

"Look, you can do that to me all you want—" I turned the toy down again "—but if you want to mess with Root, you really need to ask her first."

"Okay. Hey, Root, can we fuck?"

"Y-yes," Root stuttered out. A moment later, the sliders jumped up again. Root had to grab my arm for support. " _Please_. I c-can't take this much longer."

Shaw smirked. "The car's just up ahead. You'll just have to 'take it' until we get someplace nicer."

The nearest apartment Finch owned was about a five minute's drive away. It must've been a torturous ride for Root. She couldn't stop moving and her hands kept looking for things to grab onto. In the relative privacy of the car, she was free to make all the noises she want, and she sounded downright pornographic.

We had to help her up the front steps. As soon as we were over the threshold, everything happened in a confusing blur. Shaw grabbed Root—or did Root grab Shaw?—and they practically dragged each other to the bedroom. I kicked the door shut behind me, locked it, and got to the bedroom just in time to see Root stumble backwards into a sturdy wooden chair over in the corner of the room. Shaw was on top of her in an instant, her fingers wrapped firmly around Root's neck. The room went very still.

Damn, had it just gotten about ten degrees hotter in here?

"Traffic lights?" Shaw asked. Root nodded quickly.

"Good." Without looking away from Root, she said, "Ellie, see if you can find something to tie her legs."

Smirking, I checked the drawers and under the bed, but this apartment, not being one Shaw and I frequented, was disappointingly devoid of bondage equipment. But in the closet was a box of scarves, and I found a few that seemed particularly thick and sturdy. By the time I turned around, Root's hands were already cuffed behind her back and Shaw had already gotten Root's blouse open, leaving it hanging loosely off her shoulders. Root's chest rose and fell rapidly and her breath came in soft pants as she squirmed. I held her still while Shaw bound her ankles and knees to the chair legs, leaving Root exposed and helpless.

"Sorry, I don't have an iron handy," Shaw said. "But that's not really Ellie's thing."

"Maybe next time," Root said.

Shaw stood up and pulled out her cell phone. Root's eyes fixated on the device. "Hmmm," Shaw said thoughtfully. She rubbed her chin. "What do you think, Ellie? Fast or slow?"

"I dunno," I said. "She's been suffering a lot already. Let her have some fun already."

"True...on the other hand..." Shaw set the phone down on the dresser. "I could do something else fun."

"What's that?"

" _You_."

With an evil smirk, Shaw grabbed a fistful of my blouse and pushed me towards the bed. The back of my knees hit the mattress and I fell ungracefully backwards onto the sheets, laughing. Shaw pounced on top of me, crouching down like a cat about to snap up its prey.

"What?" Root said. "Come _on_ , turn it up, Shaw!" She rattled the cuffs, but Shaw had fastened them to something on the back of the chair, and her hands remained trapped behind her back.

"I know for a fact she's not the only one who's horny right now," Shaw said, her voice husky. She leaned down until her face was mere inches from mine. "You poor thing. You must've been suffering all _day_." Shaw's hand traveled under my skirt, rubbing the inside of my thigh before traveling northward.

"Hey!" Root said. "I'm the one with the stupid vibrator, not her!"

"Yeah, it's been hard," I said. "I'm pretty damn turned on right now."

"We'll have to do something about that," Shaw said.

"Come on!" Root whined. "Don't leave me with this thing on low!" She rattled the cuffs again and glowered at us. We ignored her. Shaw hooked her fingers under the waistband of my skirt and tugged impatiently. I squirmed my legs out of the skirt and stripped off my panties, tossing both garments aside.

"Let's have some fun," Shaw said. "Scoot back."

I did so, reclining back against the pillows at the head of the bed. Shaw ran her hands up my legs, rubbing in soft circles, but when she reached my nethers, her hands veered off to either side, leaving my desire frustratingly untouched.

"I hope we drive her crazy," Shaw muttered. I chuckled as she leaned down and planted a kiss on my thigh. I could feel her warm breath on my intimates. Sighing happily, I sank back into the fluffy pillows, lying languidly amidst the sheets while Shaw's hands and lips roved over my body.

Root was pouting and glaring daggers. I stared right back until she blinked and glanced away, squirming and grunting in frustration.

"Don't pay attention to her," Shaw said sweetly. "I'll give you something else to think about. Spread your legs a bit more."

I did so, and Shaw positioned herself between them. She winked and then, maintaining eye contact, put her head between my legs.

" _Oh!_ " I squeaked as Shaw's tongue made contact with my nether lips. I let out a shaky breath and hummed contentedly, enjoying the warmth tingling throughout my body. Shaw started out nice and slow, leaving a trail of kisses and nips around my womanhood and fueling the arousal simmering in my loins. I shifted my hips and spread my legs further.

Shaw's ministrations slowly became more eager. She used her fingers to gently spread my nether lips for easier access.

"Oh! There!" I gasped as Shaw's tongue and lips probed and explored. "Oh, oh, right there, right there!" I curled my fingers in Shaw's hair and pulled her head closer to me, guiding her to the right spots. Shaw happily obliged, sucking and licking and sending tingles of pleasure from head to toe.

I couldn't help but send a haughty look Root's way. She gritted her teeth and scowled, but otherwise didn't react.

The mattress shifted beneath me as Shaw moved, and a moment I felt two of her fingers slip inside me, aided by the wetness of my own body. I grunted in pleasure and canted my hips towards her touch.

The combination of Shaw's fingers and mouth quickly drove me towards the edge. "Oh god," I whispered. "Oh god, that's—keep going—" Shaw was more than happy to oblige.

Within minutes, the orgasm crashed over me, rushing through my body like a wave. I rode it out as long as I could, holding onto Shaw's hair until the sensations became too intense.

"Okay, okay," I gasped out. "Too much!"

Shaw eased her fingers out, made one last little kiss, and sat up, rubbing the inside of my thighs while I laid there and panted, awash in afterglow.

"Guys, can you turn it up now?" came a desperate voice.

"Did you hear something?" Shaw asked me, her face deadpan.

"Uh-uh." I propped myself up on my elbows. "Maybe you should have your ears checked by Dr. Tillman."

"Yes, because she'd be _thrilled_ to see us after what happened last time."

"All we did was accidentally start a little fire in her—"

"Guys, come on!" Root said.

"There's no guys in here. Hush up."

"I wanna cum!"

"Isn't there a roll of duct tape under the kitchen sink?" I asked Shaw.

"That only works in the movies," Shaw said.

"Maybe we could order a ball gag online with 2nd-hour delivery."

"But then we have to hear her complain for two hours."

I grumbled and glanced at Root. Her chest was covered by a thin sheen of moisture and a tiny wet spot had formed on the chair just beneath the vibrator. Her long hair was no longer stupidly perfect and wavy; it was stringy and slick with sweat. She did her best to glare at us, but there wasn't much malice in the look, only desperation.

"Think she's suffered enough?" I asked Shaw.

"Never," Shaw said with relish. "But, I guess we could give her some... _attention_ now."

If I had been Root just then, I would've known to be nervous, _very_ nervous at the restrained glee in Shaw's voice. But when Shaw stood up and snagged the cell phone from the dresser, Root stared at it with only relief in her eyes.

Shaw casually pulled up a chair in front of Root and sat down, crossing one leg over the other. She glanced at her phone and flicked the screen. Root immediately moaned, closing her eyes and leaning forward as far as her restraints allowed. Her legs strained inward against her bonds, but the scarves held her tight, keeping her legs apart. Root's body trembled, making the handcuffs jingle. Her gasps and moans were becoming more and more vocal, especially when Shaw started playing with the cell phone sliders.

I sat on the edge of the bed to watch the show.

"Don't stop," Root gasped, nervously fingering the cuffs. "Even if I tell you, don't stop!"

"Oh, trust me," Shaw said. "I won't."

And she didn't. She just sat and watched Root squirm and writhe in the chair. Root was close to orgasm. Her fingers and toes were alternating between clenching and spreading, and her moans were getting louder and louder until they cut off abruptly. Every muscle in her body tensed, pulling against her bonds.

"Fuck..." Root gasped. "Oh, fuck!" She pulled frantically at the cuffs. "Turn it off!"

"No," Shaw said. She crossed her arms, allowing the cell phone to dangle from her fingers. "You're mine. My _toy_. I can play with you however I want."

Root writhed and squirmed, tugging at her restraints, but they held her firm. She shook and bucked her hips, doing her best to get the vibrator away from her intimates. I smirked, knowing just how useless the motion was. With the way she was tied and the tightness of her panties, there was no way to dislodge the toy nestled against and within her.

"P-please!" Root begged.

Shaw didn't respond. Instead, she casually strolled behind the chair and squatted down. Suddenly, her hand shot up, her fingers wrapping around Root's neck.

" _Mine_ ," Shaw growled in Root's ear, enunciating every nuance of the word. She squeezed her hand, her fingers digging into the delicate flesh of Root's neck, and Root's eyes went wide.

I watched Root carefully, looking for signs of distress. Shaw knew what she was doing, and Root hadn't used her safeword, but this was still something much edgier than I was used to seeing from Shaw. Root's face was gradually becoming redder and redder.

Shaw loosened her grip, and Root sucked in a deep breath—and _howled_.

"Turn it off!" she pleaded.

"Tell me who you belong to," Shaw said. She squeezed again, briefly. "I want to _hear_ it."

"Y-you," Root gasped out. "I b-belong to you!"

"Good girl," Shaw said, and she tightened her fingers again, this time putting her other hand over Root's mouth and nose. She held on as Root's body abruptly tensed, her toes splayed, her eyes squeezed tight shut, and didn't let go until Root started to struggle away from her grasp.

Root gasped and sputtered when Shaw released her. Her voice was hoarse and she spoke in gibberish, making inarticulate, guttural sounds as she fought against the restraints. Her mouth was open wide and tears glistened in her eyes.

"Root?" Shaw said. "Hey." She snapped her fingers in front of Root's face. When she didn't respond right away, Shaw quickly shut off the vibrator.

"Okay," Shaw said, rubbing Root's shoulders, "you've had enough. Breathe."

"I'll get her some water," I said. Shaw nodded and uncuffed her. I headed for the kitchen, fetching a glass of water from the tap and a towel from the linen cupboard in the hall. By the time I returned, Shaw had loosened most of the scarves, leaving them dangling limply from the chair and Root's legs. I handed Root the glass of water. She immediately downed it. Shaw draped the towel over Root's shoulders.

"Thanks," Root said breathlessly. She fingered the edge of the towel and grinned up at Shaw. "I didn't think you cared so much."

"Can't use your toys again if you break them," Shaw said lightly.

"You sounded like you were having fun," I said.

"It was the best," Root said. She awkwardly brushed a strand of slick hair behind her ear. (It didn't do much for her appearance; she still looked like a hot mess.) "We should've done this sooner."

"Yeah," Shaw said. "Watching you struggle is fun."

We stripped away the last few scarves and Root was free. She leaned forward, propping her elbows on her knees, and breathed deeply.

For awhile, none of us spoke.

"Soooo," Root finally said, putting on her innocent face. She leaned in closer to Shaw. "Does this mean I'm finally forgiven for the kidnapping incident?"

"Nope," Shaw said. "But it's a start..."

#####

A week later, lounging on the couch in an apartment that was in no way connected to one Caroline Turing, Root made a call on her cell phone.

"Hey, Elizabeth," Root said. "You up for a round of torture the hacker?"

"Sorry, Root," Elizabeth said. "Trying to help a friend build a computer—"

In the background: "Is that supposed to be smoking?"

" _No_! Yank the plug!"

"I'll leave you to it," Root said. "Sounds like you have your hands full."

"Thanks. _I said unplug it!_ "

Root hung up and stared at her cell phone. She chewed the inside of her lip, considering her options, as she turned the phone around in her nimble fingers. Finally, she picked a contact on speed dial. The phone connected after the second ring.

"Shaw," came the voice at the other end of the line.

"Hey, sweetie," Root said.

An exaggerated groan.

"What's up, Root?"

"So, uh..." Root said. She took a deep breath, smiled, and said, "You free this afternoon?"

#####


End file.
